Originally Posted by
GlitzyMe
What a lovely evening you had. I visited Shipshewana for a quilt retreat about 12 yrs ago. I had to inspect every inch of Yoders (both stores) and Lolly's before the fire. The Amish are a beautiful people.
Yes, that was a terrible fire...the mercantile was rebuilt and the building of it was on CNN as the largest stick built building in the USA. It was entirely built by the Amish and my husband and I watched the progress of the building of it. There was not a hard hat in the area, the Amish worked with their own hats, their wives came to feed their husbands lunch and their children ran around bare foot at the construction site. There are photos hanging in the staircase of the building of the mercantile. We also watched the carving and painting of the horses for the carousel on the third floor. In fact, when the building was being constructed, we were given the opportunity (and did) to sign our names on the back of the finished trim pieces installed in the building. Someday in the distant future, maybe someone will find our names!