pressions from drawings furnished by him. In this article he suggested a historical map, which the Historical Society afterwards carried into effect and had published in 1875, and to which he was a valued contributor.

From a boy he evinced a passion for Indian relics, having, unaided by any one, gathered a considerable collection from the vicinity of Stony Point before he was twelve years old, and which he presented to the Hatboro Library in 1856.

Observing the interest taken in the extracts from his "History of Mooreland," published in the Intelligencer, Mr. Brown* prevailed on him to write a history of Bucks county for his paper, which accordingly appeared in its columns weekly, commencing with November 7th, 1854, and ending March 13th, 1855. The editor afterwards had the series printed in pamphlet form, commending it in very complimentary terms. Copies of this work have been recently sold at high prices, as it is out of print, and only comes down to the close of the eighteenth century. These facts are somewhat remarkable, inasmuch as it was hastily written, for from the time he received the first invitation to write it until the whole passed into the publisher's hands was but seven months.

In 1859 appeared his "History of Montgomery County within the Schuylkill Valley," a work of considerable labor and merit, and in preparation to write which he traveled afoot the previous August about three hundred miles, visiting all objects of interest and making full notes by the way.

His "Contributions to the History of Bucks County" com menced in the Intelligencer April 19th, 1859, and continued till the 20th of September following.

"The Cuttelossa and Its Historical Associations" appeared in the same paper from April 8th to September 23d, 1873, the subject being a romantic stream in Solebury, but little over three miles in length, in the neighborhood of which he had spent several weeks during the two previous autumns.

For many years Mr. Buck's mind has been drawn irresistibly towards historical and antiquarian studies. Mr. Watson, the annalist, who met him at such a meeting at Graeme Park in 1855, wrote of him shortly after as "the young historian" who

he supposed "would devote himself to such work hereafter, as he has the mind for it."

In the Home Weekly, of Philadelphia, appeared a series of articles by Mr. Buck between February, 1866, and January 23d, 1867, entitled "The Naturalist" and "Observations of a Naturalist."

In September, 1870, he accepted a situation with the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, as his other business permitted, till November, 1872, in making extracts for their use from early original records, to accomplish which required about one thousand miles of travel, and the manuscript filling upwards of four thousand compact foolscap pages. Since that time he has had charge of the manuscript department of the society, having arranged and had bound nearly one hundred volumes, of which thirty-nine are folios belonging to the Penn collection, purchased in 1871 at a cost of nearly four thousand dollars.

He read a paper before the society on the 4th of January, 1875, on the early discovery of coal in Pennsylvania, which was published by his permission in the tenth volume of the "Transactions of the Pennsylvania State Agricultural Society." A second paper was read March 13th, 1876, entitled "Early Accounts of Petroleum in the United States," which was issued in a pamphlet by Bloss & Cogswell, at Titusville, Pennsylvania, and, with additions, in the Engineering and Mining Journal, of New York.

In the summer of 1876, availing himself of the opportunities afforded by the Centennial exhibition, he made nearly four hundred drawings, with descriptions, of the best specimens of the various Indian relics exhibited by the government and

others.

In the fall of that year he wrote a full "History of Montgomery County," which was published in the spring of 1877 in Scott's Atlas. It is a remarkable condensation of history in a narrow space, first as a county, and again by townships and boroughs. To the late publications of the Historical Society he has continued as an occasional contributor.

Since February, 1876, he has also arranged and indexed thirty-three volumes of manuscripts belonging to the Pennsyl

vania Abolition Society, which was founded by Franklin and his compeers, and so satisfactorily was the work accomplished that the society at its annual meeting on the 26th of December, 1878, decided to engage him to write a full history of that famous association which has existed over one hundred years. This work will embrace the record from its institution in 1775 to the Emancipation proclamation of President Lincoln. Buck is now (1879) engaged on that publication.

Mr.

Although Mr. Buck has proved himself a devoted student, he is, what is equally commendable, an active business man also, for in the summer of 1866 he purchased a farm of two hundred and twenty-seven acres near Federalsburg, Caroline county, Maryland, of which he has twenty-five acres planted with trees now bearing fruit, and where he makes his chief home when not at the Historical Society's rooms. He also occasionally resides at Hatboro, Montgomery county, on a farm received from his father in 1872, on which he has worked a valuable stone quarry.

Judging by Mr. Buck's capacity, tastes, and his means of gratifying them, it would not be surprising if his intimate relations with the Historical Society should continue in some shape or another while he lives.

He has

His family connections living are not numerous. an only brother, James, residing in the West, and a sister, Isabella, married to J. Frank Cottman, of Jenkintown.

REV. JACOB K. REINER.

I have loved to hear my Lord spoken of; and wherever I have seen the print of his shoe in the earth, there I have coveted to set my foot, too.-Bunyan.

The man whose name heads this sketch is a venerable minister of the Dunker church at Indian creek, and was born in Hatfield township, Montgomery county, March 22d, 1807. He is the son of David and Mary Kulp Reiner, also of Montgomery county. He received but a common school education in his youth, such as was then common, embracing reading, writing,

arithmetic, grammar, geography, and some of the inferior branches of mathematics. He early exhibited a fondness for reading and study, having the opportunity to gratify his taste by the aid of the Hilltown Library and that of Montgomery Square. He also availed himself of the advantages of lyceums. during long winter evenings, taking an active part in the debates. Thus prospering in the pursuit of knowledge till his twenty-seventh year, he was married to Lydia Harley on the 28th of November, 1833. There have been born to them five children, Mary Catharine, Joel, Isaiah, Samuel, and Israel. The eldest died at the age of four years, and Israel in his twentieth. Joel is intermarried with Esther Bevinghouse, and Isaiah with Eliza Markley. Being of a religious turn of mind, Jacob K. Reiner early joined the German Baptist church. About 1841, when thirty-four years old, he was, as is the custom among them, elected a minister to preach the gospel at Indian creek, and has been serving in that calling ever since.

The Reiner family of the United States, according to Grube's tables, originate with Lawrence Reiner, a wealthy and educated Protestant, who emigrated from Germany early in the last century. He had traveled to England, and obtained from Queen Anne's government four things as an outfit for a pilgrim to the new world—an axe, scythe, sickle, and .a grant of land in the province of New Jersey, upon which he settled. But happening once to be nearly drowned while crossing the Delaware to mill (there being none in New Jersey then), he resolved to remove to Pennsylvania, which he did, and located on or near the Perkiomen creek.

His offspring, of the second generation, were Lawrence and Philip. The third generation is traced through the second son, Philip. They were as follows: Henry, a miller; Mrs. Reiff, who moved to Virginia; David, a farmer; Abraham, a wheelwright and farmer, who married Christiana Wanner, and by whom the descent is next traced.

This Christiana Wanner has a romantic and somewhat melancholy history, which is here narrated.*

The offspring of Abraham and Christiana Reiner were as follows: Mary, intermarried with a man named Stong; David, a turner and spinning-wheel maker, and the father of Rev. Jacob K. Reiner, the subject of this biography. Their other children were: Rebecca Hoffman, mother of Philip Hoffman, born January 1st, 1792, and died November 5th, 1864; Beata Stauffer, wife of Rudolph Stauffer; Elizabeth Switzer, of North Coventry, Chester county; and Philip Reiner, who had twelve children, and finally became afflicted with a mild type of insanity.

Thus Christiana Wanner and sister, at once orphaned and robbed of their patrimony, under God's ruling hand became, notwithstanding, the mothers of an exalted line of descendants, reminding one of the patriarch Isaac, who was almost slain on the altar of sacrifice, a lesson to all future ages.

Rev. Jacob K. Reiner resides in the house where he was born, in Hatfield township, and has passed his "threescore years and ten" among the same people, universally loved and esteemed. His christian humility and native modesty are such that it was with difficulty his assent could be obtained to present his name in our work. Of his preaching one of his constant hearers says:

"His sermons are very logical and convincing, so that they generally carry conviction to the minds and hearts of his hearers. He keeps so close to the subject matter of his text as almost to exhaust it. He delivers more funeral sermons, perhaps, than any other preacher of his vicinity, thus ministering often among other denominations of christians, and being respected and loved by all

*Dr. M. Wanner, the father of Christiana Wanner, was of the gentry of Germany and a man of fortune. He, with three children, left his fatherland for America either from religious or civil troubles, and died on the passage. He gave his treasure into the hands of the captain of the ship for his children, who, proving false to his trust, wickedly and basely appropriated the money to his own use, and sold the children into servitude to pay for their passage, as was customary among those who were poor. The eldest of these children was Christiana, wife of Abraham Reiner, above mentioned. Catharine, another daughter of Dr. Wanner, married a man named Steitle, whose only child became the wife of Samuel Helffenstein, who were father and mother of the eminent men of that name: Jacob, Samuel, and Albert (all Reformed clergymen), and their brothers, Dr. Abraham, Emanuel (lawyer), Isaac, Dr. Benjamin, Jonathan, and Catharine, the latter of whom is married to a man named Miller, of Philadelphia. For this anecdote, and most of the facts of Jacob K. Reiner's history, we are indebted to Abraham H. Cassel, of Harleysville.