Indiana Church Records: Difference between revisions

=== <br>Amish ===

Elkhart and Lagrange Counties in northeastern Indiana are home to the third largest concentration of Amish in North America. The Amish, or “plain people,” are a derivative of the Anabaptist heritage resulting from a division in the Mennonite churches of Europe in the 17th century. The [http://www.mennohof.org/ Mennof-Hof Amish and Mennonite Information Center] (510 S. Van Buren St., Shipshewana, 46565-8983; 260-768-4117) tells the history of the Amish and Mennonite people.  

The Amish in several communities in Indiana have published directories of their communities at regular intervals from the 1980s to the present, including Elkhart-Lagrange-Noble Counties, Adams-Jay Counties, and Nappannee-Kokomo-Milroy. These volumes feature a wealth of information for each family, including husband’s name, wife’s maiden name, the names of each spouse’s parents, children’s names, dates of birth for each individual, children’s marriage partners, the family address, husband’s occupation, and notations of whether each child is living at home, married and living within the community, married and living in another Amish community, single and living outside the family home, or has left the Amish faith. The directories also include history of the communities and maps showing locations of Amish homesteads and schools.  

Goshen College (1700 S. Main St., Goshen 46526) is home to the Mennonite Church USA Archives-Goshen (Newcomer Center; 574-523-3080; toll-free 866-866-2872 ext. 23080; email History@MennoniteUSA.org; http://www.mcusa-archives.org/Archives/GuideAMC.html) The archives houses the official records of the Mennonite Church and personal papers of Mennonites, Hutterites, Amish and other Anabaptist groups. Complementing the Archives is the Mennonite Historical Library (Good Library, third floor; 574-535-7418; email mhl@goshen.edu; http://www.goshen.edu/mhl/Home). The collection of the Mennonite Historical Library includes genealogy resources, history books and Mennonite periodicals.  

Two colleges that participate in the Private Academic Library Network of Indiana (PALNI) have Mennonite-Anabaptist tradition and may be resources for records of or about these denominations in Indaina. These are Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary (3003 Benham Ave., Elkhart, 46517; phone 574-296-6253; http://www.ambs.edu/library/) and Goshen College (1700 S. Main St., Goshen, 46256; 574-535-7427; http://www.goshen.edu/library/). Their catalogs may be searched collectively by using the PALNI online catalog at (http://www.palni.edu/).