Amy and I both were born and raised in Holmes County OH, the second largest Anabaptist community on earth. Every year our family makes the arduous journey across the country to visit family and for a week and a half we luxuriate in Holmes County’s finest: the food, the culture, the commerce – and the stories. 

For good stories, Holmes County is unequaled. So many Anabaptists in such close quarters, such a spread of lifestyles in a population who spends so much time together, visiting, eating, telling stories. 

The Mt Hope auction grounds can be thought of as the New York City of a particular local demographic of Amish boy: the more conservative Old Orders, the Danners, the Schwartzentrubers. If you’re twelve years old with a little cash to burn and the opportunity to give Dad the slip, there’s nothing you might desire that can’t be had on the auction grounds. There’s the flea market where one can buy a folding bowie knife, an orange plastic drone with blinking eyes and no batteries from Taiwan, or a pocket laser. One can pick up choice profanities by side-eyeing the graffiti on the catwalk boards, spit down onto the bulls in their crates, kick the pigs through the pen slats or whistle at the girls. Cheap hot dogs, warm Pepsi, or a bag of greasy popcorn for the younger, more cash-challenged. It’s LA, Vegas and Sea World all rolled into one Pennsylvania Dutch speaking hullabaloo. 

Two men brought two barn cats to be auctioned at the small animal sale, held every Wednesday in Mt. Hope. They left their cats and stealthily took seats in the crowd. The cats in their cages were brought in. The auctioneer raised his eyebrows and began his brassy song. One of the cat men nodded his bid. Across the bleachers the other tipped his hat. Back and forth, bid and counter-bid. The auctioneer was amused. He rapped his gavel, he bounced on his toes. A hundred dollars, two hundred. The crowd was speechless, the young farm boys stood frozen, unbelieving. Three hundred, four hundred, five hundred. The crowd craned over its shoulders, trying to catch the movement and identify the bidders. Six hundred, seven hundred. At seven hundred fifty the cat sold. The other cat was held high and again the cat men played catch with their bids, again over seven hundred dollars. The two men winked at each other and slipped out the back door.

The next week, the next sale. The auctioneer walked in and stopped. Cage after cage after cage of hissing, spitting, slit-eyed barn cats wadded in cages, crates, boxes. Cat hair hung in the stale air. Behind them stood rows of breathless, wide-eyed Amish boys, their scratched, bloodied hands jammed in their pockets. $700 could buy a shotgun, a drone, 70 bull calves, a good rabbit dog, a decent lawn tractor that could be geared up and made into a rogue ATV. And if you had five cats….

The auctioneer shrugged and gamely began. Five dollars, one dollar, one dollar, one dollar, anyone one dollar. The auctioneer panned the crowd. The ringmen held their right hands aloft, fingers twitching. One dollar, one dollar. The Amish boy’s hats began to droop. They scuffed at the sawdust. They’d been had. One dollar, one dollar, one dollar. The cats seethed in their cages.

Wall Street has had bad days, fortunes lost, entire economies collapsed. Vegas has seen lives ruined. But only a twelve-year-old boy with a fortune in barn cats could know the pain of the day Mt. Hope turned out to be Lost Hope.