Good news! For 2018, we upgraded our geotrail to an official Geocaching GeoTour! Learn more about Pennsylvania's Clearfield County GeoTour, which offers a series of 5 related geocaching adventures: Forgotten Clearfield, Hometown Heroes, Waterways, Cemeteries, and Parks and Recreation. Codes are hidden within each cache. Collect 25 codes from across all 5 series and you qualify for a collectible prize. If you complete all 5 and have your passport validated, you can receive a trackable geocoin.
John Rumbarger came to this area of Clearfield County in the early 1870’s. He had his property surveyed and divided into lots to form a town out of the wilderness. This town he named Rumbarger. At about the same time, John DuBois, a lumberman from Williamsport, also arrived and saw the economic potential. He built a sawmill and provided jobs. Eventually there were two towns, DuBois and Rumbarger but they soon grew together and one name had to be chosen. DuBois, of course, was the name of the consolidated communities. John Rumbarger had set aside about seven and one-half acres of his property for a cemetery. It was used as a burying ground before the town was surveyed as there are tombstones with a death date of 1870 on them. It is the final resting place of many Civil War soldiers, notable people from the history of DuBois and the “ordinary” citizens who helped build our community. When John died, in 1889, his will stipulated that all his property was to be sold. The cemetery was purchased by three men who formed the DuBois Cemetery Company in 1890. It was operated as a “for profit” company for many years. By the early 1900’s, Herbert A. Moore and Arthur L. Cole were the only officers of the company. After the death of A. L. Cole in 1916, H. A. was the secretary-treasurer,and sole officer of the cemetery company until his death in 1951. Without directors or money to maintain the cemetery it deteriorated and became overgrown. In the mid 1970’s Wallace Lindsay began to reclaim the cemetery from the wilderness it had once again become. Mr. Lindsay, Adrian Bakas and Edward Heffner tried to get ownership of the cemetery but were not able to obtain a deed. Since then, volunteers have been trying to care for the cemetery. There is now a new group, the Rumbarger Cemetery Preservation Society, a non-profit organization, which hopes to legally acquire ownership. Many projects are planned, as well as the ultimate goal of providing perpetual care for the cemetery. One of the many interesting stories relating to the cemetery is that of Henry Longnecker, a veteran of the Civil War. DuBois Courier, April 8, 1887 Our last week's issue contained a brief notice of the death of Henry Longnecker at the poor farm on Thursday of last week of consumption. (Henry was the first inmate of the Poor Farm) The deceased had been a resident of this place for over two years. He was aged about fifty six years. A son and daughter, his only known relatives, live in Middletown, Dauphin County, Pa. The overseers found $27.80 on his person after death. The remains were interred in the Rumbarger cemetery on Friday, in the department set apart for the poor. Later it was discovered that Longnecker had been honorably discharged from the army, two discharge papers having been found. He will, therefore, be entitled to the $30 State appropriation allowed indigent soldiers for burial expenses. The remains will be taken up tomorrow and interred in the space allotted for soldiers graves, the discharge papers having in the meantime been forwarded to Clearfield for approval by the County Commissioners