| Book Reviews | The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, 130.2

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| Book Reviews | The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, 130.2 | The History Cooperative

Book Reviews

Building on the Gospel Foundation: The Mennonites of Franklin County, Pennsylvania, and Washington County, Maryland, 1730–1970. By Edsel Burdge Jr. and Samuel L. Horst. (Scottdale, PA: Herald Press, 2004. 927p. Illustrations, notes, bibliography, index. $49.99.)
The interpretive thrust of Building on the Gospel Foundation explores the arrival of Mennonites, primarily by way of Lancaster County, to Franklin County, Pennsylvania, and Washington County, Maryland, and the gradual emergence of three distinct streams of Mennonites by the 1970s: old order, conservative, and evangelical. The development of these three streams, however, followed a torturous path. Church fights, leadership struggles, pride, excommunication, schism, new alliances, internal growth, community outreach, incursions of "the world," and continued migration into the area provide the backdrop to this story.	1
As the tale unfolds, the authors identify "traditionalists"/"conservatives" who are in tension with "activists" by the nineteenth century, often over the issue of Sunday school and the practice of revival meetings. By the twentieth century, "moderate activists," "moderate traditionalists," "conservative activists," and "aggresso-conservatives" find their place between the traditionalists and the "progressives"/"activists"/"aggressives" at the other end of the spectrum. An ever-expanding list of issues separates these groups. While it is not clear if some of these many groupings are synonymous with one another, it is clear, even with the simplified tripartite scheme the authors describe as in place by the 1970s, that the unfolding of Mennonite organizational identity in Franklin and Washington counties was complex in its development. For example, the authors report that the conservative grouping, which is the largest, includes twenty-seven congregations with ten different organizational affiliations.	. . .

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