Amish Country
Ohio’s Amish Country is a fascinating time capsule of patchwork fields and stone hamlets and villages where horse-drawn buggies trot along cobbled streets punctuated with quaint stores, dairies, blacksmiths and antique stores. One of the region’s largest towns, Millersburg provides a distillation of the region’s traditions, attractions and scenery. The country is a playground for outdoor enthusiasts with accessible parks and wildlife centers that provide ample opportunities for hiking, horse-riding and cycling amid Amish Country’s green and pleasant lands.
Amish Heritage
A sprinkling of museums, historic attractions, eye-catching Victorian architecture and antique emporiums make the town of Millersburg one of Amish Country’s most well-rounded communities. The town’s architectural centerpiece is the restored Victorian House Museum, a paradigm for Queen Anne Victorian style, and home to an extensive collection of antiques and exquisite period furnishings. Founded in 1830, the traditional canal town of Roscoe Village is one of Amish Country’s most inviting towns, with evocative cobbled streets lined with Victorian buildings, traditional stores and cafes. The visitor center traces the town’s development with detailed dioramas, intricate maps and models of the canal and lock system, aqueduct and a working gristmill.
Farm Life
To gain deeper insight into Amish Country’s rural traditions, it’s worth a visit to the Schrock’s Heritage Village. The farm experience extends to an antique mall, candle factory and quilt bar. One of the county’s most family-oriented attractions, children can interact with the farm animals, watch milking and horseshoeing demonstrations and volunteer for field work. Ohio’s Amish Country boasts a singular and outstanding craft heritage that find expression in an array of superlatives: There’s the world’s largest cuckoo clock in Sugarcreek, one of the nation’s oldest livestock auctions in Kidron, and the world’s largest retailer of historical technology, Lehmans.
Tourism Ohio
On Land
Amish Country is an excellent base for outdoor excursions throughout the county. Holmes County’s scenic rails-to-trails path begins at Hipp Station in Millersburg. With diverse habitats, ranging from expanses of grasses and legumes to primal woodlands, Woodbury Wildlife Area, a 15-minute drive west of Roscoe Village, affords prime watchable wildlife along a series of novice trails where opportunities for camping, picnicking and fishing abound. Resident mammal species include wild turkeys, opossum, cottontail rabbits, white-tailed deer and ruffed grouse. With myriad bird species, including bobolinks, short-eared owls, rough-legged hawks and numerous songbirds, the park is a magnet for ornithologists. Impassioned anglers convene at some 42 ponds within the area that are liberally stocked with bass, bluegill, red-ear sunfish and channel catfish.
On the Water
The crop fields, shrubby coverts, grasslands and woods of the 5,671-acre Killbuck Marsh Wildlife Area, just north of Millersburg, offer excellent fishing and hunting opportunities. Killbuck Creek draws anglers from across Amish Country for its rich stores of northern pike, carp and bullheads as well as panfish that inhabit several ponds. The area is also popular for hunters of waterfowl, namely wood duck, Canada goose, blue-winged teal and mallard. A cherished pastime for visitors and locals is to take a 45-minute canal boat ride from Roscoe Village aboard the Monticello III down a restored section of the Ohio and Erie Canal, pulled by sturdy draft horses.
Festivals and Events
Millersburg (also known as “The Burg”) combines a rich and celebrated Amish and Mennonite history with a passion for century-old crafts that find expression at the Holmes County Antique Festival in October. The festival coincides with the fall leaves, hailed by National Geographic as one of the best leaf-peeping spectacles in the nation.
Swiss Bliss
In late September, nearby Sugarcreek (which goes by the moniker of “Little Switzerland”) hosts its annual Swiss Festival, the most popular festival in the state, featuring the very entertaining steinstossen (or stone throwing), a Swiss cheese eating contest, live music and entertainment, parades, local food vendors, games and a yodeling contest.
Home in the USA
Fleeing religious persecution in Europe, the Amish immigrated to Pennsylvania during the 1700s and then settled across the Midwest and into Canada. The first Amish people arrived in Ohio in the early 1800s. Most Amish earn their living through agriculture and shun modern-day conveniences and technological trappings, including electricity, cars and cellphones. Plain and conservative dress remains the norm.
Roscoe Rocks
Historic Roscoe Village provides rich insight into the region’s history with costumed interpreters giving demonstrations and informative tours of designated living history buildings. At the Johnson-Humrickhouse Museum, an eclectic ensemble of small exhibits includes Native American, historic Ohio, decorative arts and East Asian artifacts.
For More Information
Holmes County Chamber of Commerce & Tourism Bureau
877-643-8824
www.visitamishcountry.com
Ohio Tourism Division
800-282-5393
www.ohio.org
