Yet more entirely-too-long-windedness doth follow henceforth.
I'm pretty much in agreement with you about Amishland, Jeannine, hope I didn't create any impression otherwise. I wasn't overly impressed by the site even before I read about it on this thread; I'd been doing a lot of research into varietal histories, and I'd already spotted some claims to "Amishland exclusives" that are patently false.
As a frankly not-terribly relevant aside: I'd note that in a very few cases when something like that happens, there may have been a sort of honest mistake on the part of some sellers, especially small-timers (not, obviously, Amishland, though.) When I put some locally grown seeds of (Albuquerque heirloom) Wenk's Yellow Hot on Ebay last year, I noted that "as of this writing, I am the only seller on Ebay offering Wenk's." I took pains to include the words "as of this writing" because I knew perfectly well that theoretically, five minutes later some other Ebay dealer might have posted a listing also. It didn't happen, but it easily could have.
I mentioned what I mentioned about Kwintus because I really do think that-- even though this thread started as being specifically devoted to Amishland as a topic-- it's as good a "place" as any to open up the dialogue a bit and talk a bit more about good business practice versus not-so-good. I often don't see certain ethical boundary lines as being so cut-and-dry as some other people may, and that's one thing I rather like about myself.
...And now for something really irrelevant (I think): off and on, I continue with a little research here and there into my parents' parents' etc. genealogy. On my mother's side, there's some Pennsylvania Dutch, some of which I'd often guessed maybe came from the Hessian mercenaries that George III of England hired to fight against George Washington. Earlier today, I double-checked some pages I downloaded from ancestry.com when I was a member, and it looks like I was wrong. Looks like that particular "breeding line" of my ancestors were almost certainly... Amish.
About the last factoid on earth I thought I'd ever stumble upon. I'm sure Mom had no idea, either. Who, me, part Amish? Knock me over with a feather...
You might think that might make some perceptible difference, one way or another, in how I feel about Amishland. So far, nothing. I still wouldn't buy from her. I just wouldn't... I don't see "Amish heirloom" as being any big deal. After all, my best educated guess is, at least 70% of the big beefsteak tomatoes grown in the world, and quite a few mid-size, have some Pennsylvania Dutch heirloom ancestry in their background, so it's not like mein mutter's vater's völker have been so forgotten, ja?
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