Down a dark farm lane in eastern Lancaster County, under the glow of a hissing gas lamp, the bespectacled, powerfully built Amishman laid a small stack of paperwork out on the kitchen table. Statements. Official letters.

And one faded, dog-eared leaflet, an advertisement for the American Association of Camping Cabins and Conestoga Log Cabins. This, said the man, was what he thought he was investing in: A company that built, sold, leased and promoted log cabins.

He had no idea that he and other Amish and Old Order Mennonite investors were actually funding more than a dozen disparate companies — a roofing firm, a land development business, a campground and amusement park and more. "I never heard of those companies," said the man, who asked that his name not be used.

But he knew several people from his church who had purchased the unsecured promissory notes, which promised to pay up to 9 percent over five years.

"I seen and talked to people who were in it," he said. He trusted his friends. And he trusted the seller, a "Plain Mennonite" named John M. Sensenig.

Now this Amishman is out $10,000 — more than $15,000, if you count the interest he was promised. And his is but a pittance; an acquaintance lost 20 times that, he said. According to an Old Order Mennonite committee, some 1,500 Amish and Mennonite investors purchased $65 million in unsecured notes from Sensenig's company, Conestoga Log Cabin Leasing. The committee is trying to find out what happened to the money — and if there's any left.

The issue continues to be a hot topic in Plain communities. The Amishman said it wasn't just individuals who purchased the notes — he knows of at least one church that invested and lost money.

He said that over the years he spoke with Sensenig numerous times about his money. And he talked of Sensenig's attempt to register his businesses with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and start selling securities to individual investors again. The Pennsylvania Securities Commission stopped his sale of securities in 2005.

"Boy, he was a smooth talker," the man said of Sensenig. "He said 'Just hang on — once we get registered we're gonna make some money, you'll get your money.' "

"But later he said someone in the church had reported him" to church officials, the man said.

"And it all went downhill."

Property sold
According to a deed recently recorded in the Lancaster County Courthouse, Sensenig and his wife sold their home in the 900 block of Valley View Drive, New Holland, on Dec. 23 for $300,000. According to newspaper records, the buyer, a woman, is a member of Martindale Mennonite Church, Groffdale Conference, where Sensenig was also a member. A phone message left with the buyer, Nancy B. Martin, was not returned.

A reporter visited the Sensenig home Friday afternoon; no one answered the door, but a woman in the wood machinery shop in the building next to the home said Sensenig was "at work." She promised to tell him a reporter hoped to speak with him and took a business card.

Another voice-mail message seeking comment last week was not returned. Since mid-January, the Sunday News has attempted to contact Sensenig more than a dozen times by phone, e-mail and other methods; no response has been received.

The house on Valley View Road is listed in state records as the registered office address or principal place of business for at least 10 businesses either founded or funded by Sensenig. Several of them appear to be "dormant," according to the Old Order Investor Advisory Committee.

And many were funded with money raised through the sale of promissory notes, wrote the committee in an Oct. 22 letter to investors.

The Amishman interviewed for this story bought promissory notes from Conestoga Log Cabin Leasing, or CLCL, on several occasions in the early 2000s. Like others who did the same, he saw an advertisement the company placed in Die Botschaft, a newspaper that serves readers both here and in Plain communities around the country.

"It was attractive," said the

Amishman of the rates promised by Sensenig's firm — 7 percent on six-month notes, 8 percent on three-year notes and 9 percent on five-year notes.

Still, he said he knew there had to be some risk involved. "That's why I didn't put more money in there," he said.

But his understanding was that the money was invested in Conestoga Log Cabins, a manufacturing firm Sensenig had co-founded in 1997 (and sold in 2007).

And for a while, in the early 2000s, everything seemed to be humming along. The Amishman got statements showing that his nest egg was growing. He kept the "interest" in his account. His mother, who had purchased $20,000 worth of notes from CLCL, received checks in the mail for the interest accruing on her account.

Those checks stopped coming around 2003, the Amishman said. He wasn't sure why.

The Amishman admitted he had misgivings. But CLCL continued to do a brisk business selling the notes. And even after the Pennsylvania Securities Commission — acting on a complaint from a Sensenig investor — issued him a cease-and-desist order in 2005, telling CLCL to "halt the offer and sale of unregistered securities," few pulled their money — just 11 of the 1,127 investors at the time.

Asked why he didn't demand his money back, the Amishman said: "I didn't know it was that bad then." Sensenig had sent a letter to investors pointedly asking them not to withdraw their money, stating that state officials "will shut us down and sell us out at salvage value which would cause you and everybody to loose [sic] a great deal of money."

That might have frightened some investors. While some, like the Amishman, owned CLCL's promissory notes as part of a diversified investment strategy, others had invested large sums in CLCL's notes.

The Amishman told of a neighbor, who was severely injured in a farming accident and is now impaired both physically and mentally. Virtually all of the family's savings, some $200,000, was used to purchase the promissory notes, he said. The family could lose all of it.

In an online forum for Mennonites called "MennoDiscuss.com," one participant wrote that "I know of a couple who sold out and invested everything they had in [CLCL] while they went to the mission field. Then came back to this."

The poster continued: "A local church from this area had [its] building fund invested there."

The Amishman said he also knew of at least one Amish church that purchased the promissory notes.

The Old Order Investor Advisory Committee was appointed in January 2009 to "act as advisors to the individuals who lent money to John Sensenig and his companies," according to the Oct. 22 letter sent to investors. The committee said it hoped to liquidate the companies in which Sensenig still holds an interest in order to return as much money to investors as possible.

However, the committee reported, bank loans and equipment leasing contracts must be satisfied first, and there is "very little chance of much return of interest or principal to the 1500 individuals."

Allen Hoover, a member of the committee, said the group will not talk to the press about the matter.

There is said to be some umbrage because the committee is made up exclusively of Old Order Mennonites — Sensenig himself is a Wenger Mennonite or "team" Mennonite — who rely on horse-drawn transportation, though the October letter from the committee states that Sensenig "cannot at this time be a member of the church."

But many of the investors were Amish and have no say on the committee, though the Amishman interviewed for this story and other Amish investors did receive the October letter.

The Amishman said he has heard that the committee is close to completing its investigation. He regrets not acting on his misgivings a few years ago, when he might have gotten his money back. Sensenig, he said, "was not a dumb man. He was under the impression this was going to get better. I think his intentions were good.

"But it was just because he was a Plain Mennonite that he got that much money, that's the only reason."