On June 1881, the Yeager Memorial Evangelical Lutheran Church in Rainsburg was dedicated. Built during 1880-1881 at a cost of $39 thousand, this magnificent two-story brick edifice, 65 feet by 38 feet, modeled after the Trinity Lutheran Church building in Bedford, was made possible by the generosity of the Shaffer family who lived on the farm now owned by J. N. Land, Sr.
John Christian William Yeager, for whom this church is named, was born in Breslau, Prussia, in 1783. He came to this country in his early years, studied theology in Philadelphia under Dr. Kelmuth, and was licensed as a Lutheran Pastor in 1818 by the Pennsylvania Synod. He accepted a call from Schellsburg in 1822 and labored faithfully in Lutheran congregations throughout Bedford County as long as his health permitted. He became known affectionately a “the father of the Lutheran Church in Bedford County”; and indeed, he was called “Father Yeager” By all who loved him.
Rainsburg was settled by descendants of deeply religious, skilled craftsmen from central Europe who came into Friend’s Cove seeking homesteads where they could persue their crafts and establish farms. The earliest records of the Friend family in Pennsylvania and Delaware begin in 1675. Much of the area adjacent to Rainsburg was deeded to members’ of the Friend family; both the Woods Methodist Chapel and the Yeager Lutheran Church sites are on land deeded to Joseph Friend in 1783. Rainsburg Borough was created in 1800 from lands owned John A. May and John Friend, and named for an early pioneer hunter, John Rains.
On this Centennial Re-dedication, we consider the intertwined histories represented.
In 1799 the Rev. John Steck of Carlisle, PA, became the first horseback missionary for the Lutheran Church to this area. In 1793 a Rev. Lange served Lutherans in Rainsburg and Somerset County! By 1803 the Rev. Christian Henry Hanker lived in Rainsburg to serve the Zion Lutheran congregation which was then worshipping in their original log edifice used jointly by the Lutheran Reformed congregations. Pastor Hanker met an untimely death by drowning in 1813 w2hile fording a stream at Madley on his horseback mission to Somerset County.
In 1833 a brick structure replaced the earlier log church and still stands on the same site. Known as “Double Brick Church” the Friend’s Cove United Church of Christ is the present-day occupant of the modern church building adjacent to the old Union Church. It was not uncommon for Lutheran and Reformed congregations to share the same building.
From his home in Schellsburg, it is said, he saddled his horse at midnight Saturday to begin his circuit of preaching throughout the county. At one time he was responsible for ministry to nine congregations, ranging from Dutch Corner to Morrison’s Cove to Friend’s Cove! Father Yeager was not adept at English, and by 1841, Allegheny Synod was sending students to Bedford County to preach in English.
In 1838 he moved to friend’s Cove and devoted his entire ministry to the old Zion Congregation (the afore-mentioned Union Church) until his death April 17, 1844, at the age of 61. Pastor Yeager is buried behind the historic 1833 brick church; you can read his tombstone in the first row directly behind the old structure at “Double Brick” Church.
“…His health was very precarious for the last few years, being much impaired through excessive labor and exposure. Brother Yeager was emphatically the apostle of Lutheranism in Bedford County. Many churches owe their origin to him. Night and day was he on the errand of love and mercy…He devoted the last few years of his life particularly to the congregation in Friend’s Cove. During the last year of his sojourn here he was unable to preach much, but as a faithful servant of Christ he did all he could, working while it was called day…He left a widow, two children, several step-children… He was a friend and benefactor. His disposition was amiable… being a pattern of meekness and patience…”
To be continued...
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