CLINTON COUNTY GENEALOGICAL SOCIETY CEMETERY GUIDE            

MUNICIPALITY:  Logan Township
CEMETERY NAME:  Tylersville Lutheran and Reformed Cemetery SCHADT NUMBER:  043

AKA:  Tylersville Community Cemetery

Number of Burials (approximate): 300

Dates of Activity: 1828 - 1983

Documentation/Publication: 

CCGS, The Cemeteries of Crawford, Greene and Logan Townships and Loganton Borough (2004)

 

Directions/GPS: 

From the center of Loganton (the intersection of Routes 477 and 880), travel West on Route 880 for 7.0 miles.  The cemetery is on your right, behind a wrought-iron fence.  Directly across from the cemetery, Route 880 turns left and goes over the mountain to Rebersburg.

N40 59.450 W77 25.541

Landowner / Caretaker:

Tylersville Community Cemetery

Loganton, PA 17747

 

Condition/Needs: 

Excellent

 

History:

Paul Frantz, an early local resident, gave land for a schoolhouse and public burial ground about the year 1828.  This was before Tylersville had become very widely settled, or even had a name.  Prior to this time, Logan Mills was the nearest settlement in this part of the valley.

In 1840 it was decided to construct a Lutheran and Reformed, or Union, Church on the site.  The trustees were Jonathan Shaffer, Isaac Frantz and John S. Ruhl

Carpenters were John and Henry Greninger, Christopher Shaffer, and Isaac Frantz.  The Union Church was dedicated 9 August 1841.  It was patterned in great detail after the Union Church at Schracktown, with elevated seats, and a pulpit at the front door.  The Tylersville Church, however, had two aisles and two front doors.

The church was remodeled with the interior reversed, and the renovated building was rededicated 11 February 1872.  In 1882, the Reformed half of the congregation drafted a new constitution and changed their name from Salem Reformed Church to St. John's Reformed Church.

In 1906, the Reformed people determined that they needed a separate house of worship, and split

from the union arrangement.  The Reformed Church built a new structure in Tylersville (which is still active today, as St. John's United Church of Christ), and the old building reverted entirely to the Lutherans.  The Lutheran congregation dwindled and eventually disbanded.  The church building was torn down by Paul Tonerin 1964.  The old communion set is currently deposited in the Heisey Museum.

On 15 September 1948, the cemetery united together with the other two cemeteries in Tylersville to form the "Tylersville Community Cemetery" for uniform maintenance.  The initial office was at the home of LaRue O. Grieband the initial nine board members were John Bierly, George G. Grieb, LaRue O. Grieb, Lulu Karstetter, T. L. Nicholas, Charles Miller, Russell Miller, Torrence Miller, and Mrs. Cora Simcox.

In its long history, the cemetery was never exclusively restricted to members of the Lutheran and Reformed congregations.  It was open to the community.  As such, the cemetery is the last resting-place of many of the early settlers.  Among those who repose there, in unmarked graves, are Isaiah and Nora Colby, a young couple who were cruelly murdered at their homestead in the Narrows near Tylersville in 1887.

The cemetery is nearly full of graves, and there have been no further burials there since 1983.  It is open to burials on previously sold lots, of which there are no records, but no new sales are occurring there.