MEDIA ADVISORY

See page 3 for contact information

 

Lauffer Family Reunion

Sunday, August 17, 12:00 noon-6 p.m.

 

in the family’s ancestral barn, now the offices of the

Westmoreland Conservation District, Donohoe Road, Greensburg

 

Scheduled events include dedication of a plaque,

 explaining the 130-year-old barn’s unique story.

 

Eleven children sounds like a pretty big family by today’s standards, but in the mid-1700s, when Christian Lauffer and Susannah Best were raising their clan of six boys and five girls in Westmoreland County, large families weren’t all that unusual.

 

What may be more amazing is that the descendents of those 11 children today number more than 30,000 men and women who have settled all over the United States…and that, thanks to the Internet and the Christian Lauffer website* (www.lauffer.us), this number is continuing to grow and many of these relatives regularly keep in touch with one another.

 

In 2009, a second edition of the family history will be published that details each known descendant’s name (which will be more than 30,000 names), related historical information, and many of the family adventures that have taken place during the 280 years since Christian Lauffer, his mother, and stepfather first came to America.  (The first Lauffer History was published in 1906, and contained some 800 names.)

 

*This website has been maintained by Jim Lauffer, a great-great grandson of Peter Lauffer who lives in California, and it has had thousands of visitors interested in finding their roots in this family.

But before that occurs, on August 17 of this year, there will be a reunion – the 58th consecutive one, and the second to be held in the barn once owned by Christian and Susannah’s great grandson, Peter.  Some 100 of Christian’s descendants are expected to attend the event in a most unique location  -- one that, through a series of circumstances, transformed the family ancestral barn into the offices of the Westmoreland Conservation District. 

 

The Lauffers discovered the family connection to this historic structure in August 2006 when a great-great granddaughter of Peter Lauffer, Shirley Gosnell, was visiting Westmoreland County from Arizona.  She asked her cousin, Peggy Anthony, to giver her the “Lauffer Tour” of the county, pointing out sites of significance to the family, such as the house in Penn Township once owned by Peter.

 

 In talking with the house’s current owner, Shirley asked about the barn that had once been on this farming property and learned that a local developer, Kim Edward Miller, had donated it to the Westmoreland Conservation District…and that the District in turn had enlisted the help of Amish craftsmen to dismantle the barn, move it to its present location on Donohoe Road about one mile from Westmoreland Mall, and reassemble it for use as the District’s headquarters.

 

Shirley and her brother John Lauffer then visited the District, and explained their family connection to the barn to Conservation District Manager/CEO Greg Phillips.  “We are able to substantiate that Peter Lauffer (1827-1886) purchased a farm in Penn Township, and erected a large brick house on it in 1873,” Peggy Anthony explained.  “However, we cannot say with certainty whether he also built the barn, or whether it was already on the property when he bought it.  We are sure, however, that he used the barn during his lifetime.”

 

Greg explained how the District’s conservation ethic was a driving force behind his organization’s desire to reclaim the barn when it was about to be lost to development, and extended an open invitation to the Lauffers to hold their family reunions in the newly adapted barn.  The family did so for the first time a year later, in August 2006.  One hundred five Lauffers attended that reunion and were so taken by the barn and its story that they voted to fund a permanent brass plaque to commemorate the barn’s history.

 

District staff worked with the Lauffers to write and design the plaque, which will be permanently installed near the barn’s main entrance (see photo).  The plaque will be formally unveiled and dedicated during the August 17, 2008 Lauffer reunion.

 

More information on the Lauffer family and the Lauffer/Westmoreland Conservation District barn follows.  Peggy Anthony, Lauffer reunion organizer, also is available by phone prior to August 17 to provide additional details.  She can be reached at 724-989-4501 or horsegranny@aol.com.  Greg Phillips, Westmoreland Conservation District Manager/CEO, can be reached at 724-837-5271.

 

ABOUT THE LAUFFERS

Christian Lauffer the Pioneer was born in Germany in 1723 and came to America with his mother and stepfather in the 1730s.  He married Susannah Best in 1751 in Northampton County.  They had 11 children, 6 boys and 5 girls.  He and his family, except for one of his sons, moved to Westmoreland County about 1772 and settled in Hempfield, Mt. Pleasant, and Penn townships (in subsequent generations, the Lauffer family descendents have moved to all areas of Westmoreland County as well as to surrounding counties and surrounding states). 

 

Four of Christian Lauffer’s sons participated in the Revolutionary War, including Peter who was a shoemaker for George Washington.  All of the daughters married men whose families moved to Westmoreland County at the same time as the Lauffers.  One of the daughters, Susannah, married Simon Drum who owned a tavern in Greensburg.  She had the honor of cooking a dinner for the Marquis de Lafayette when he was traveling through Pennsylvania.

 

Two of the sons and three of the daughters stayed in Westmoreland County while the others moved westward in the great migration of the early 1800s.  As a result, the Lauffer family has tens of thousands of descendents all across the United States.

 

The main occupation in the early days of this family was that of farmer, but there also were lawyers, ministers, storekeepers, and many other occupations.  There are many places where you can still see the farms, farmhouses, store buildings and other businesses owned by Lauffers.

 

The first documented reunions of the Lauffer family were in 1902, 1903 and 1905.  There are photographs of these reunions, which were well-documented and photographed, in the first Lauffer history book.

 

There is no documented record of any reunions from 1905 until 1950, when the Isaac Lauffer branch of the family began to hold reunions again.  They have been held every year since 1950.  We are currently working on documenting some other reunions that were being held by other branches of the family.

 

The early reunions were held at the homes of family members.  The reunion would be an all-day affair beginning with a church service, lunch and dinner (everyone would bring a covered dish), orchestras and bands, and even fireworks in the evening.  These reunions would have a couple of hundred people in attendance.

 

The reunions in the 1950s were shorter events.  They began at noon and sometimes lasted into the evening with both lunch and dinner being provided.

These reunions were sometimes held at people's homes, but mostly at public parks such as Wolfe's Grove, Crabapple Lake, Maurice Goddard State Park, Mammoth Park, Manor Park, Bushy Run Battlefield, and most recently the Westmoreland Conservation District.

 

The attendance varies, with last year’s count at 105.  People attending come from California, Arizona, New York, Illinois, Florida, New Jersey, Ohio, and of course, Pennsylvania.  Many of our family members still reside right here in Westmoreland County and some still on the old family homesteads.

 

The Lauffers sees its family reunions as an important activity to remind people of their heritage and the values that have been passed down through the generations. The reunions provide a reminder that these values need to be carried on for today’s and future generations.  Without the recorded history, these values may be missed altogether.

 

 In the last few years we have undertaken projects, with the money to fund the projects being raised through raffles and donations.  The first project was to purchase and erect a tombstone for Christian Lauffer the Pioneer.  This year we are placing a plaque outside the Conservation District barn to explain the origins and process by which the barn came to the Conservation District.  Next year’s suggested project will be the clean up and maintenance of the Old Bash Cemetery where Christian Lauffer the Pioneer and many other family members are buried.

 

ABOUT THE BARN

When the 1880s-era barn was donated to the Westmoreland Conservation District, the organization needed to move it from Penn Township to its site on Donohoe Road in Greensburg, about one mile from Westmoreland Mall.

 

The District asked the Amish to help and these craftsmen spent months carefully dismantling the original structure, marking each of the barn’s more than 300 hand-hewn beams and timbers with a code so they could be rejoined in their new location exactly as they were originally.

 

More than 80% of the barn’s original timbers of poplar, white oak, red oak, and chestnut were reused, and actually are in such fine shape that they should be able to stand and serve in their new purpose for at least another 130 years.

 

Reclaiming a barn about to be lost to development is practicing the conservation ethic that the building’s owner, the Westmoreland Conservation District, preaches.  It also promotes sustainability and honors our country’s agricultural heritage (the Conservation District itself got its start 59 years ago when local farmers gathered in a neighbor’s barn to discuss soil, crops, and conservation).

 

The barn’s style is a “bank barn,” and it’s easy to see why this design was so popular with farmers in southwestern Pennsylvania.  By creatively combining both one- and two-story sections in the same structure, the builders took advantage of the region’s gently rolling landscape, nestling their structures into the natural slope of the land.  Being snugged up to a bank of earth also helped to moderate the temperature inside these early barns. 

 

Today, the District’s barn draws even deeper on the earth’s natural HVAC qualities for heating and cooling the structure by using a geothermal system that uses 19 wells, each 150 feet deep.  This geothermal system pulls heat from the ground in the winter to warm the building … and, in the summer, the system cools the building in the summer by serving as a place to deposit the heat that builds up inside the building.

 

 In adapting the barn for its new use, the Westmoreland Conservation District and Pittsburgh architect A. Richard Glance worked to incorporate a number of sustainable technologies, such as this geothermal system, as well as a variety of recycled/recyclable materials, energy-efficient fixtures, and low-maintenance practices, so that the structure itself is a model of conservation in action.

 

Many of the barn’s conservation features are incorporated into the District’s education program as a way to encourage others to also adopt these sustainable practices.