Site offers matchmaking services for rural singles

Last Valentine's Day, The Rural Blog mentioned an online dating service aimed at rural singles in the United States and Canada called FarmersOnly.com. Back then, the site was a year old and had grown to more than 50,000 users. It now boasts 85,000 users, and this year The Associated Press picked up on the story.

"Playing the dating game isn't easy in rural America: Tens of thousands of twentysomethings have moved out in recent decades, small towns have shrunk, younger farmers have become a dwindling commodity," Sarah Cohen writes. "Or to put it another way ... there's a lot of land and not that many people."

That's where FarmersOnly.com comes in, which has led to more than 40 marriages since being founded by Ohio publicist Jerry Miller in late 2005. For $30, someone can post a profile and photo for three months. Cohen relates the stories of three different couples that met on the site, including that of Sonya Rinker and Tom Henisee (above in an AP photo by Carolyn Kaster) who live in rural Pennsylvania and now are engaged.

"She has ordered the dress, he has been measured for his Western-style tuxedo," Cohen writes. "The baskets, candles and centerpieces will be green and yellow -- John Deere colors. There will be male and female cow figures atop their cake. They've chosen the song that will introduce them as man and wife: Kenny Chesney's "She Thinks My Tractor's Sexy." After the wedding, they'll repair to their home -- Pap's house. And they'll make the seven-mile journey ... by tractor." (Read more)

Seemingly picking up on that story, The Sentinel, the 15,000-circulation daily in Carlisle, posted a Web update this afternoon in which Larissa Boyer offers some tips for online dating. (Read more)