Pennsylvania Dutch

Most of the English colonies in America were begun by a man or by a group of men to whom the king granted a large tract of land and gave broad rights to govern the colony. Perhaps the greatest of all proprietors was William Penn,* who had adopted Quakerism* as his faith. He had plans for establishing a colony where persecuted quakers might have a refuge. The land was granted in a charter in 1682, and named Penn’s Woods or Pennsylvania.

Penn termed his undertaking a “holy experiment’’. He believed that under a just government people could live to- gether in harmony and peace. In his famous“Frame of Government’’ he attempted to put into practice a liberal constitution that would secure such harmony. He insisted that the Indians be given the same treatment as the settlers. He emphasised reform rather than punishment. In a day when New England Puritans were searching for “witches’’, Penn dismissed a case concerning a woman charged with riding on a broomstick with the observation that there was no ordinance in Pennsylvania against riding on a broomstick.

William Penn lured mento America promising themthat “every man could worship God according to his own conscience.’’ Swiss and Germans, fleeing religious persecution came in waves. They settled in the verdant valleys of the Susquehanna* and Schuylkill* joining with English quaker pioneers. The newcomers came to be called Pennsylvania Dutch — actually “Deutsch’’ slurred by English tongues

Two ways of life grew side by side. The Gay, or Fancy Dutch (Reformed, Lutheran, United Brethren and others)* adopted many of the customs of the world around them. They gathered about Kutztown where their annual festival* keeps alive a legacy of gaiety. The Kutztown festival displays crafts that live today as they did centuries ago: basket-weaving, rug, quilt, bonnet and candle making, painting of hex signs,* which have become the trade mark of everything Dutch. Experts demonstrate Gay Dutch jigging and hoedowning* and quickstepping. At night champion sets compete for prizes and the boards drum witha dancing free-for-all until the fiddlers beg for mercy.

The Plain Dutch (the Amish, * River Brethren, Dunkers, Mennonites) settled around Lancaster. Their strict doctrines impelled them to remain apart; many stay apart, outnumbered nine to one by the Gay Dutch.

Mennonite sects range from the Black Bumpers, who drive cars but blacken the chromium to prevent pridefulness, to the General Conference Group, who dress “like the world’’ and enjoy TV and telephones.

River Brethren and Dunkers baptise outdoors by immersion even if the ice must be cracked. But it is the Amish who are the “plainest of the plain’’. They cling to the old and plain in clothes, house furnishings, religious customs, and the German-sprinkled Pennsylvania Dutch dialect. They believe that to pose for a picture — a “graven image’’ — violates God’s will. Men smoke cigars or pipes, rarely cigarettes, and begin to grow beards ontheir wedding-day. The older men still wear black clothes and black wide-awake hats of the early Puritans,* while many of the women wear white-laced caps at the back of their heads.

An outlander on approaching Lancaster County will see in contrast with the stream-lined highway a landscape of eighteen-century Europe. The farm-steads consist of clean, white timbered buildings, well-grouped, shaded by ample trees and commanded by spacious high-pitched barns. Their villages are trim, with a Sunday-go-to-meeting appearance.* They drive along the roads in hooded buggies, and plough their fields with teams of horses.