News
Pinecraft Blogger Hopes PBS Film Could Change Amish's Minds
| March 6, 2013Pinecraft resident Katie Troyer teeters between the English world, the media and the Amish.
It's a delicate balance, but she manages it between taking photos for the Pinecraft Pauper, blogging and following her own relationship with God without attending church.
Hate-crime Amish sent to faraway prisons
| March 6, 2013CLEVELAND, OH — The eight men convicted of an Amish hate crime in Ohio have been assigned to prisons scattered across the United States, the U.S. Bureau of Prisons said.
Bishop Samuel Mullet, 67, leader of the Bergholz, Ohio, group who was prosecuted with 15 of his followers for a series of beard- and hair shearing attacks on perceived enemies of the breakaway sect, was notified last weekend he had been "re-designated" to a prison in Texarkana, Texas.
Child injured in crash involving horse and buggy
| March 1, 2013LOYSVILLE, PA — A 5-year-old Loysville girl was flown to Penn State Hershey Medical Center after a car crashed into a horse and buggy in Perry County, according to state police in Newport.
Police said the girl was one of four people in the buggy when it was struck Monday afternoon on Route 850 near Fisher Hill Road in Northeast Madison Township.
A Computer Fit For The Amish
| February 27, 2013Last week, I had a story on an Amish trade show. It was mostly about power tools, but there was another other thing that we didn't mention in the online version: The booth selling computers to the Amish.
My Amish Childhood
| February 22, 2013I can still see his face. Lean. Determined. Framed by his lengthy beard. I can see him running up the hill toward our house. He was carrying his bag of doctor implements.
Mom was having chest spasms, and any real doctor was miles away—across four hours of the broken, rutted, dusty Honduran road we took only as a last resort.
The running man was my Uncle Joe. The smart one of the family. The older brother. The intellectual genius. When Uncle Joe walked by, we stopped talking and listened intently when he spoke. On this day, he rushed by, not paying any attention to us children.
Amish boy dies in barn accident
| February 20, 2013MONTGOMERY, PA — A nine-year-old Amish boy was pronounced dead following a barn accident on Monday.
Amish Mafia star arrested on hit-run, other charges
| February 15, 2013Lancaster, PA — Lebanon Levi's sidekick is in legal trouble after a state constable nabbed him for a stack of criminal warrants, according to officials.
However, John Schmucker's attorney said the fugitive arrest won't keep the "Amish Mafia" star off the small screen.

I am a Little Confused
| February 13, 2013I am a little confused between "staying and going" right now. I am Amish, but I had left for a year and a half and I liked it.
You probably get this every day! But I have a story for you. I grew up about 4-5 miles from Aylmer, Ontario. They call the community Amish. I happened upon Ira Wagler’s book about a month ago. It was a really good story. He had incredible courage in his journey. My story was different, but you can relate to it, right? Now I'm back with the Amish, but I'm faced with the decision of leaving again and it's tough!!
Amish delegation expresses remorse to Israel
| February 11, 2013Although there is no shortage of extraordinary sights at the Wall, the visit by a group of 31 Amish people (29 Americans and 2 Canadians) had people staring in wonder as the group filled the air with their heartfelt hymns. The group came to Israel to apologize to Jews for not previously recognizing the Jews as the chosen people.
Oil riches await many in Amish community
| February 10, 2013A Chevron rig drills for natural gas behind the property owned by the Mast family in Lawrence County, Pa. Energy companies are leasing land throughout Pennsylvania and Ohio where Amish families like the Masts live.
Ohio Amish beard-cutting ringleader gets 15 years
| February 8, 2013CLEVELAND, OH — The ringleader in hair- and beard-cutting attacks on fellow Amish in Ohio was sentenced Friday to 15 years in prison and 15 family members received sentences of one year to seven years.
Trading in a buggy for dreams of NASCAR
| February 8, 2013The closest Marlin Yoder came to having a set of wheels as a youth in an Amish family was hitching the horses to the family’s buggy.
He left that world behind to pursue his dream of NASCAR glory.
Now 22, Yoder has been gone from his family’s home since age 17½. He’d long entertained thoughts about living as one of the “English,” as the Amish refer to outsiders, and he moved in with a friend who’d left the same Amish community a couple of years earlier.
Samuel Mullet, Amish Beard-Cutting Leader, May Get Life Sentence
| February 7, 2013TOLEDO, Ohio -- Federal prosecutors want a life sentence for the leader of an Amish breakaway group convicted in a series of beard- and hair-cutting attacks, saying it's highly unlikely the attacks would have happened without his involvement.
Amish youth drowns while cutting ice on Wis. pond
| February 5, 2013TOWN OF CLINTON, WI - A 17 year old Amish youth drowned while cutting ice on a spring-fed pond in the Town of Clinton in Vernon County of western Wisconsin.
Prosecutors Want Life Term for Ohio Amish Leader
| February 5, 2013Ohio- Federal prosecutors want a life sentence for the leader of an Amish breakaway group convicted in a series of beard- and hair-cutting attacks, saying it's highly unlikely the attacks would have happened without his involvement.
Two Wayne County men charged with killing unsold pups
| February 4, 2013NY- Authorities have charged two Amish men with killing a dog and her nine puppies after no one bought the young animals.
Smyrna man gets 32 years after Amish robbery try
| February 2, 2013DOVER DE – A 46-year-old Smyrna man received a 32-year prison sentence for attempting to rob an Amish couple at gunpoint last July, the Delaware Attorney General’s Office announced Friday.
Mark Carter was sentenced to prison Thursday after pleading guilty to two counts of attempted robbery, and one count each of possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony and burglary on Dec. 6, 2012.
Amish Mafia star arrested on hit-run, other charges Amish Mafia: Alan Lee Beiler scheduled to appear in Perry County on Feb.
| January 28, 2013A star of the Discovery Channel television show "Amish Mafia" is scheduled to appear again in Perry County court in three weeks.
Alan Lee Beiler, 35, of the 800 block of Country Lane in Paradise, Lancaster County, has been ordered to appear at 9 a.m. on Feb. 15 at the county courthouse in New Bloomfield for central court.
Amish Man Arrested on Sex Charges
| January 28, 2013W Farmington OH -- An Amish man from West Farmington was secretly indicted by a Trumbull County grand jury on numerous sex charges involving young girls over a four-year period.
Daniel Miller, 46, is being held at the Trumbull County Jail on a $250,000 bond. He pleaded not guilty during his arraignment Monday to 11 charges, including two counts of rape, eight counts of gross sexual imposition and one count of sexual battery, involving five girls between the ages of 11 and 13.

We Are Placing You In The Ban
| January 26, 2013On behalf of your decision [leaving the Amish church], we now also have to make a decision. According to Glaubens Artikel #16 (which is based on Bible), we need to put out of the church whoever is not willing to stay with what he or she promised at baptism – or comes in unfruitful works of darkness. If we do not hear from you before Sunday, January 27, we will be voting with the church to do so. This will give you six weeks to decide. If we do not hear from you within those six weeks, we have no choice but to put you in the ban.
Biden claims to have heard gunshots from Lancaster Amish school shooting
| January 25, 2013Washington—Vice President Joe Biden said he was "literally" within earshot of the tragic 2006 Amish school shooting in Nickel Mines, estimating he was about a quarter of a mile away from the school at a golf outing on that warm October morning.
Amish farmer charged with killing young Eagle
| January 22, 2013Zook, an Amish farmer, could face up to two years in jail and fines up to $5,000 if found guilty and depending on the feelings of the judge. In addition, a judge could require Zook to pay up to $5,000 to "replace" the eagle.
Shunned by Amish, pastor now pointing them to the Gospel
| January 20, 2013Formerly Old Order Amish, Sam Burkholder now works on lawn mowers to make a living while leading Fairview Baptist Church in Pollock, Mo., as a bivocational pastor and serving the Rays of Hope ministry to the Amish that he and his wife founded.
Shunned by Amish, pastor now pointing them to the Gospel
| January 20, 2013Kirksville MO -- Sam Burkholder and his wife Barbara are former members of the Old Order Amish Church who saw in their Christian relatives "a peace and joy that the Amish didn't have."
Amish In Midst Of Oil World They Seek To Escape
| January 20, 2013Pennsylvania - As oil companies move into Amish communities to extract oil through hydraulic processing, residents are speaking up, calling out oil companies for carrying out a long-term plan of deceit and manipulation. But not all Amish are in the same boat, with some benefiting from larger leasing payouts than their neighbors who signed onto contracts years ago.
6-Year Sentence In Amish Attacks
| January 18, 2013DECATUR, Indiana - An Adams County woman has been sentenced to six years in prison for her role in robbing Amish.
A look at the real people behind the characters of 'Amish Mafia'
| January 11, 2013Lancaster PA -- If a violent group of Amish "protectors" exists in Lancaster County as represented on a hit reality television series, Steven Echternach and Jonathan Heisse would know about it.
The two local cops are District Attorney Craig Stedman's liaisons to the Amish community, working with local Anabaptist groups on crimes of all sorts.
Bipolar disorder more common among the Amish
| January 10, 2013Eastern Mennonite University: The link between genetics and mental illness continues to engage Abram Hostetter, a psychiatrist in his fourth decade of world-recognized research into why Old Order Amish are more susceptible to bipolar disorder than the general population.

Samuel Girod
| January 10, 2013I was born in 1982 into the Swiss Amish culture. My parents and grandparents were born and raised in the Swiss culture also. My grandfather moved out of Adams County, Indiana where there is a large Swiss settlement. I was an Amish single man, 30-years-old, who had everything any Amish man wanted of what their culture allowed. But often I was unhappy and depressed. I tried not to show it, because I knew it would worry my parents.
A Year After Attacks, an Amish Community Grapples With Its Future
| January 9, 2013Bergholz OH, More than a year before the violent beard-cutting assaults spread terror among the Amish of eastern Ohio, several followers of Samuel Mullet Sr., the leader of an insular settlement in Bergholz, used similar practices on each other. Left, a barn on the Mullet family compound is being renovated.