GORDONVILLE (AP) – Spring in south-central PA brings an annual tradition in Amish communities: mud sales. The country auctions in Lancaster County began in the 1960s and can bring thousands of bidders to do more than a million dollars in sales. The auctions benefit local fire departments. Amish people make and donate much of the food and items for sale. Gideon Fisher, who chairs the Gordonville mud sale committee, said that as more fellow Amish have sought work off the farm, there has been a shift in interactions with others. He sees it as a good thing. Fisher says 50 years or 100 years ago, most Amish were farmers. And now today there’s a lot of them going out into roofing, construction, and all kinds of other jobs. The first mud sale was held in 1965 by the Bart Township Fire Company, according to Steve Nolt, Director of the Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies at Elizabethtown College. Within about a decade, similar sales sprung up in Gordonville, Farmersville, Strasburg, and Gap.
