50 Fun Facts About Amish

The Amish are named for which Anabaptist leader, whose followers split from the Swiss Mennonites in 1693?

The word 'Amish' began as an insult used by his opponents in 1710; he was born in 1644.

The Anabaptist movement from which the Amish emerged began in 1525 in which Swiss city?

Conrad Grebel and George Blaurock baptised each other there in circles around the reformer Huldrych Zwingli.

What two-word formal name do the Amish go by, distinguishing them from the newer, more modern subgroups?

When people say Amish today they normally mean this group, though New Order and Beachy Amish also exist.

What do the Amish call the set of church rules that governs dress, technology and daily life?

It is largely unwritten, differs from district to district and is reviewed twice a year by every member.

Amish migrants of 1717-1750 settled first in the area that became which Pennsylvania county?

Land pressures and the French and Indian War later pushed many of them on to Lancaster County.

Mid-19th-century Amish immigrants settled mostly in Ohio, Illinois, Iowa and which Canadian province?

Most of these later immigrants ended up joining more liberal groups rather than the Old Order.

As of 2024, roughly how many Old Order Amish live in the United States?

There are more than 6,000 in Canada too, and the population roughly doubles every 20 years.

Because of large families and high retention, the Amish population doubles roughly how often?

Between 1992 and 2008 alone the North American Amish population grew by 84 percent.

What do the Amish generally call non-Amish people?

Outside influences are described as 'worldly'; the term applies regardless of a person's actual ethnicity.

Which language, a form of German, do most Old Order Amish speak at home?

'Dutch' here is a corruption of Deitsch, meaning German, not a mistranslation; Indiana's Swiss Amish speak a Bernese dialect instead.

Amish church membership begins with adult baptism, usually between which ages?

Baptism is the moment a young person commits to the church after the period of freedom known as Rumspringa.

What do the Amish call the period from around age 16 when youth experience the outside world before baptism?

The Pennsylvania German word means 'running around'; elders see it mainly as a time for courtship.

How often do Old Order Amish hold worship services?

Services take place in a member's home or barn; only the more modern Beachy Amish worship weekly in church buildings.

An Amish church district typically contains how many families?

Each district is led by a bishop, ministers and deacons chosen partly by election and partly by drawing lots.

How are Amish bishops, ministers and deacons chosen?

The practice of choosing by lot, or cleromancy, follows the New Testament account of the apostles replacing Judas.

Old Order Amish children typically finish formal schooling after which grade?

They attend their own one-room schools; the Supreme Court upheld the practice in 1972.

Which 1972 Supreme Court case put Amish religious freedom above compulsory high-school education?

Jonas Yoder and two other fathers had been fined $5 each for keeping their 14- and 15-year-olds out of high school.

Married Amish men grow beards but are forbidden from growing what?

Moustaches are associated with the military, which the pacifist Amish reject; the beard signals manhood and marital status.

Instead of buttons, which are considered too flashy, Old Order Amish clothing is fastened with what?

Metal snaps are also used; women wear bonnets and aprons whose colours can signal marital status.

What is the Amish practice of social avoidance imposed on members who are excommunicated?

The severity varies by community; the 1693 split itself was partly over whether banned members should be avoided even at meals.

The Amish value Gelassenheit, a German word meaning what?

Alongside it they prize rural life, manual labour and humility.

Which US county has the world's densest Amish population, about 48% in 2020?

Its settlement is the second-largest overall; the largest is in Pennsylvania.

The world's largest single Amish settlement is in which Pennsylvania county?

Its Amish community is a major tourist draw; the Holmes County, Ohio settlement is second with about 37,770 people in 2021.

The Amish are formally exempt from which US government programme, having a religious objection to it?

Most also refuse commercial insurance, relying on the community to cover medical bills and disasters.

Which Amish subgroup, unlike the Old Order, drives cars and worships in the local language?

Both the Beachy and New Order Amish also emphasise the New Birth, run Sunday schools and seek converts.

In which decade did the New Order Amish split from the Old Order?

The split came in 1966; the far more conservative Swartzentruber Amish had emerged earlier in Holmes County.

Which ultra-conservative Amish affiliation emerged in Holmes County, Ohio?

They are among the strictest groups, rejecting even the reflective safety triangles most Amish put on their buggies.

What is it called when a small founding population, like the Amish, makes some recessive conditions more common?

Overall the Amish do not have more genetic disorders than the general population, just a different mix.

The 1985 thriller Witness, with Harrison Ford among the Amish, was set in which county?

Directed by Peter Weir, it earned eight Oscar nominations and won for Original Screenplay and Film Editing.

Who directed the 1985 film Witness?

The Australian director later made Dead Poets Society and The Truman Show.

After the 2006 West Nickel Mines School shooting, the Amish community's response drew attention for what?

Members visited the shooter's widow and attended his funeral; the school was demolished and rebuilt as the New Hope School.

Shoofly pie, a favourite of Amish country, is made primarily with which sweet ingredient?

Its name is popularly said to come from having to shoo flies away from the sticky filling.

The whoopie pie, sold by Amish vendors across the US, is known by what name in the Pittsburgh region?

Maine also claims the treat, but Pennsylvania Amish tradition is one of its main roots.

The Amish first came to Pennsylvania for religious freedom offered by which colonial founder?

Rich soil and a mild climate were the other draws for the early-18th-century settlers.

The 1693 Amish-Mennonite split turned partly on treating 'fallen' believers. What did Ammann's side insist on?

The rival Reistians would only bar such members from communion, and their side became the Swiss Mennonite Conference.

The Egli Amish, who withdrew from the Amish church in 1858, later renamed themselves what?

They were one of many groups that drifted away in the 19th century; roughly two-thirds of Amish became Amish Mennonites.

Between 1862 and 1878, Amish bishops held yearly ministerial conferences known by what German name?

The very idea of bishops meeting to discuss uniformity was so progressive that the traditionalists soon boycotted them.

Which reformer's circle in Switzerland gave rise to the Anabaptist movement?

The Zürich radicals became known as the Swiss Brethren, ancestors of both the Amish and the Mennonites.

According to USDA licensee data, the Amish run over 98% of the puppy mills in which state?

The figures are 97% for Indiana and 63% for Pennsylvania, a controversial side of Amish agriculture.

Amish traditionally travel by horse and buggy and reject which utility for their homes?

The Ordnung's restrictions aim to protect family time and face-to-face conversation, not to reject technology for its own sake.

Which Coolio hit did 'Weird Al' Yankovic rework in 1996 into a song about plain Amish living?

Coolio publicly objected at the time but later admitted the refusal was 'stupid', noting Weird Al had parodied Michael Jackson and Prince too.

TLC's 2012 reality series Breaking Amish followed five young Anabaptists moving to which city?

Four were Amish and one Mennonite. Later seasons were subtitled Brave New World, Los Angeles and Brooklyn, and spawned the spinoff Return to Amish.

Pinecraft, a popular winter getaway for Amish and Mennonites, is in which Florida county?

It began as the Sarasota National Tourist Camp in the 1920s and had 486 residents at the 2020 census; visitors come mostly from the Midwest and Pennsylvania.

Amish friendship bread is made from what, passed between friends like a chain letter?

A common recipe uses one cup of starter for a loaf, keeps one cup going, and gives three cups away. The result resembles both pound cake and coffee cake.

Shipshewana, home of the Menno-Hof Amish museum, is named after a member of which tribe?

The LaGrange County town had 839 residents in 2020. Elkhart and LaGrange counties together hold the third-largest Amish settlement in the US.

The widely debunked 2012 reality series Amish Mafia aired on which network?

It followed 'Lebanon Levi' in Lancaster County. Scholars, local papers and police all said the secret organisation was a fiction made for entertainment.

In WWII, Amish men assigned to Civilian Public Service mostly worked in what?

Hospital postings brought young Amish men into contact with progressive Mennonites and the wider world, and many of them never joined the Amish church.

How often do all members of an Amish church district review their Ordnung?

Communion is held only if every member consents to the rules, which cover everything from power-line electricity and telephones to clothing.

As of June 2025, which state had the third-largest Amish population after Pennsylvania and Ohio?

Indiana had about 67,300 Amish, behind Pennsylvania's 95,400 and Ohio's 86,300. Old Order communities existed in 32 states that year.

The Clinic for Special Children in Strasburg, PA, found treatments for which once-fatal disorder?

Founder-effect genetics make some recessive metabolic conditions unusually common among the Amish. The clinic lets families get care without leaving the community.