Amish in the News

LANCASTER COUNTY, PA —Several thousand people gathered for a prayer ride for missing Amish teenager Linda Stoltzfoos. Rescue crews continue to search for her following an arrest of a man in July who has been accused of kidnapping her.

he Swartzentruber Amish community in Cattaraugus County, New York are in danger of having their horse-drawn carriages run into the ditch by Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s all-renewable-energy express train.

It was Father’s Day, and Linda Stoltzfoos was on her way home from church. She told friends she’d meet them at a youth meeting after she went back to her family’s Bird-in-Hand farm to change her clothes. But she never made it, and she hasn’t been seen since.

The former owner of a Pennsylvania creamery who ran a Ponzi scheme that preyed on members of the Amish and Mennonite communities was sentenced Monday to 10 years in federal prison for his crimes. 

Every day on Ohio roadways, semitrailers, cars and trucks traveling more than 50 mph zip past horse-drawn buggies clip-clopping along at a 6-mph pace.

A Paradise Township, Lancaster County, man has been charged with the kidnapping of Linda Stoltzfoos, an 18-year-old Amish woman who went missing after a church service near Bird-in-Hand on Father’s Day. She hasn’t been seen since.

A Carroll County ordinance requires new homes to be built with sprinkler systems, but the commissioners unanimously voted to make an exception for an Amish family’s home that will be without electricity.

At about 12:30 p.m., on Sunday, June 21, Linda Stoltzfoos, a tall, slim 18-year-old Amish woman, left a church service at a home in Bird-in-Hand, east of Lancaster, Pa., and started walking home. And then, she vanished. 

BIRD IN HAND, PA - The search for a missing 18-year-old Amish woman in Lancaster County continues today.

A Fillmore County District Court judge's ruling that would require Fillmore County Amish men to install subsurface sewage treatment systems despite religious objections was upheld by the Minnesota Court of Appeals.

LANCASTER, PA — In mid-March, Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf ordered all Pennsylvania schools to close, prompting an abrupt shutdown of the state’s public and private schools – and, it turns out, Amish one-room schoolhouses.

Who needs machinery when you can get a few hundred of your closest friends to help you move your barn?

The criminal complaint against the Amish bishop is clear about how he learned of a church member’s alleged sexual assault on three young teenage girls:

PEQUEA TOWNSHIP, PA — An Amish bishop was charged this week by Pennsylvania authorities with failing to report sexual abuse allegedly committed by one of his congregants.

Police in Northeast Ohio broke up a large gathering of Amish people over the weekend after a man spotted a group of buggies and called 911 to report a stay-at-home order violation.

The party took place in Huntsburg Township, Ohio.  Huntsburg is home to a very large Amish population about an hour East of Cleveland.  There have been reports along with pictures of large Amish gatherings sent to police during the Stay Home order.   Read More

MERCER COUNTY, PA - State Police say they broke up a drinking party involving eight Amish teens and one 20-year-old in Mercer County.

WARREN, OH — When it comes down to love or the law, it seems the law will prevail.

On Thursday, The New York Times reported that an Amish community in Ohio is mobilizing to create medical supplies for local hospitals.

Hospitals and clinics in cities across the U.S. have recently established drive-through testing for COVID-19. It’s the strategy that enabled countries like South Korea and Japan to test as many as one out of every 142 people for SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes the infectious disease, thus helping to track and slow the virus’ spread.

BLOOMFIELD, IA - Back in mid-March, Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds gave a directive that all Iowa schools close for a period of four weeks, a measure taken to help control the spread of the coronavirus that causes the COVID-19 disease.

UNITY, ME - Most Wednesday mornings, the delicious smell of freshly made doughnuts entices crowds of people to the Amish-run Community Market in Unity.

COLUMBUS, OH - The leader of a breakaway Amish group in Ohio who was sentenced to prison for beard- and hair-cutting attacks will get to to serve the rest of his sentence at home after his attorney argued the new coronavirus puts the 74-year-old bishop at risk.

On Friday night, the bishops in a tri-county area of the Amish community had a meeting to discuss COVID-19 and their response to it.

One-room Amish schoolhouses across Lancaster County are closed for the week, yet scores of Amish wedding goers Tuesday filled a big tent on a farm near New Holland.

Ruth Lapp said she always let her babies crawl on the floor when they were young. And when her children complain of a sore throat, she gives them a spoonful of vinegar, a remedy she says could cure any infection.

CLEVELAND, OH - Amish bishop Sam Mullet, one of more dozen people convicted in a series of nighttime raids and beard cuttings on his enemies in eastern Ohio, wants out of federal custody because of the coronavirus.

MANHEIM TOWNSHIP, PA — When Earl Hurst bought 100 acres of farmland in rural Lancaster County in 1952, he planned for the fertile fields to help sustain his family. And for a generation, they did just that.

ARTHUR, IL — Mennonite farmer Willis Kuhns said 2019 was “as frustrating as it gets.”

NEW WILMINGTON, PA — One teenager is injured after a garbage truck collided with an Amish buggy in Pennsylvania.