I was thinking the other night, about how I started this quest to learn about my family. As a young man growing up in our family, there was always a mystery about our family. My parent’s had married later in life, when they were 43 and 33. My father’s parents had died long before I was born. My mother’s parents had died as well. I had a step-grand mother on my mother’s side, but it was not a close relationship, even though she lived a few blocks away. My father’s brother, Uncle Bart was always around when i was young but he died when I was 12 or 13. And I remembered Uncle Walt, who was really Great Uncle Walt. But he died when I was very little. We had no cousins, at least as far as I knew. And there was little talk of our ancestors. I knew of Harry Kellar, a magician, who was my mother’s uncle. But not much more.
I think it was a picture that I saw in an old album. Uncle Walt, my great uncle, was a dedicated family historian. He collected materials, letters, pictures, books and more and put them into albums, on the Kauffman’s and the Coover’s, His father and mother. He searched the history of the Kauffman’s back beyond the arrival of Isaac Kauffman in America. And he wondered about Isaac, and the telefleurer, The Reverends Isaac Kauffman and their relationship, just as I wonder today. At some point as a young person, I looked thru those albums and a picture caught my attention. For some reason, my mother passed all these gems to me. She knew I was interested in history. Or maybe she just wanted someone to take them. She gave me boxes of 78 RPM records and boxes of books. I had probably 100 boxes that I carted around for years and stored under the stairs. Perhaps that is why I got them.
The second event that pulled me into genealogy was a letter from Harriet Armstrong that I received on May 1, 1994. I don’t know how she found me and chose to write to me. But she did. Now, Harriet was an elderly lady who was living with her daughter in the Pittsburgh area. The Armstrong’s were descendants of John Coover my great great grandfather on my father’s side. John was one of the early settler’s in Mechanicsburg in the 1800s. He had seven children, five daughters, Susannah, Sarah, Marianna, Ann Elizabeth, and Julia, a son Amos, who died his first year of life and an unnamed child, who died in childbirth. This is the worst situation for a large landowner mindful of his legacy. Harriet was the granddaughter of Susannah who married a Long who’s daughter married a Merkel. So, while the Coover name was lost, Harriet’s interest in the family was not.
Her letter was about the cemetery, known as Barbace. Barbace was actually a farm on the west side of Mechanicsburg, owned by the Keller family. Salome Keller was the wife of John Coover. On the corner of the farm was a family cemetery, where some of the ancestors of the family were buried, including her and John. Harriet, now in her late 80s had gone, after many years, back to Mechanicsburg on a visit and had looked for the cemetery. She could not find it. Instead she found a large factory on the land where the farm had been. The farm house had been demolished as well as everything else. How could that happen? The laws in Pennsylvania protecting cemeteries were non existent in the early 1900s, but had been greatly improved in the mid 1900s Cemeteries were not to be destroyed. What could be done? Could I help?
How Harriet found me is not clear. I was living in Reston, VA at that time busy with running a business and raising three kids. I did not have time to get involved in this problem. But, I felt I should do something. So, i spoke with a friend who was our attorney and he did some research and suggested I contact an attorney in Mechanicsburg to investigate. And so I did. I got a bill for $500 from that attorney and was told that the cemetery did in fact still exist. Best $500, I ever spent.
Later that summer, I drove up to Mechanicsburg, loaded with research and my knowledge based on the materials that Uncle Walt had given me. I arrived in the late morning and started at the old Coover House, a focal point of local historians for the town. l was directed to Eva Williams, who gave me an autographed copy of her book, “More Homes of Mechanicsburg” which included homes of Kauffman’s and Coover’s and others. Then I was pointed to the Historical Society of Mechanicsburg, located in the old train station in town. There I met people who knew the history of the town and of course the Coover legacy. Then I was off to discover “Barbace”, not far on the outskirts of town. It was as expected in deplorable condition but it existed.
And last, I went out to Chestnut Hill Cemetery, on the other side of town, where most of the Kauffman’s were buried, my grandfather, Percival Coover Kauffman, my great grandfather, Levi Kauffman, and my great great grandfather, Andrew Isaac Kauffman.
Well, I was hooked. Mechanicsburg was the center of my family’s history. But like any good story, it was only the beginning. This website will include our ancestor’s their families, their homes, their stories and their final resting place. I hope you enjoy it.