Manheim, a town (pop. 4,246 in 1950) on the Big Chiques, 10 miles (16 km) northwest of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, was laid out in 1762 by Henry W. Stiegel, and named after Mannheim, Germany. The noted Stiegel glassware was manufactured here in colonial times. In 1756 over 100 of the 118 families in the surrounding township of Rapho were of German-Swiss extraction. Two Mennonites, Stauffer and Eby, made grandfather clocks here in the early 1800s. Peter Longenecker about 1763 and Abraham Hostetter in 1839, both Mennonites, built gristmills nearby. The Manheim Mennonite Church has its meetinghouse in the town, built in 1896. A large and thickly populated Mennonite community surrounded the town in the 1950s.

Adapted by permission of Herald Press, Scottdale, Pennsylvania, and Waterloo, Ontario, from Mennonite Encyclopedia, Vol. 3, pp. 456-457. All rights reserved. For information on ordering the encyclopedia visit the Herald Press website.

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