Obituary - Huntington Democrat
Huntington, IN
Thurs., 19 April, 1888

Jacob Bippus, one of the oldest settlers of Warren township, died Thursday evening at his residence. He had not been complaining of feeling bad, and was found dead sitting in a chair. Apoplexy is the supposed cause of the sudden death.
Mr. Bippus was eighty years and two months old. His funeral will occur tomorrow at 1:30 p.m. and his remains will be interred in the cemetery near the Lutheran church, west of West Point (now Bippus).
There is no man that was better known to the citizens of Huntington county, as he came here many years ago. He was a church member and the town of Bippus was laid out by and named after him. He had three sons and one daughter. Geo. J. Bippus, Vice President of the C. & A. railway is his son.

Jacob Bippus Pioneer In
Church and County Affairs
BORN IN GERMANY, HE CAME
FIRST TO OHIO, AND THEN TO HUNTINGTON COUNTY
Jacob Bippus was born in Wertenberg, Germany, on February 14, 1808. He married Anna Marie Galster, who was born at Wertenberg on August 13, 1807. With the Galsters and others, Mr. and Mrs. Bippus decided to try the realities of the new world and so, together, they sailed for America in the beginning of the '40's, having been attracted to Tuscrawas county, Ohio, where the earliest religious colony in the state of Ohio was established by Moravian missionaries in 1772.
Jacob Bippus, it may well be fancied, found great interest in the sacred memories which cluster around the founding of Christianity in Tuscarawas county and was active in the Moravian church organization in Dover.
Old records of the church reveal that Jacob Bippus and his wife, Anna Maria Galster Bippus, were received into membership on October 26 1845. The records show the occupation of each member and set out that Mr. Bippus was a carpenter, Old inhabitants could point out buildings he erected during the residence in Dover.
It might be pertinent to add a few lines concerning the tenets of the denomination known as the Moravians, to whose creed the Bippus family found great interest and in which church they held membership. Its origin reaches back into periods of antiquity or, to be more exact, to July 6, 1415, when John Huss had been pledged personal safety for the purpose of pleading his cause before a council at Constance. the pledge was violated and he suffered death. Out of his ashes immediately arose an organization first called the Brethren's church, which quickly adopted the name of the Moravian church on account of beginning in Moravia. The church, under this title, was completely organized in 1457, 100 miles east of Prague, in the confines of Moravia, but since the World war is in the republic of Czecho-Slovakia. This founding of the church was sixty years before Luther and was 100 years before the Protestant Episcopalians were established. The church outlived severe persecution and execution of followers. For centuries it did not expand as rapidly as other denominations for the reason that its early leaders did not wish to interfere with other creeds, but rather, preferred colonizing and forming of settlements in which were fostered high forms of education and Christian culture. The church has extensive missions throughout the world and by common consent is recognized as standard-bearer in the very best lines of religious work.
The old policy of exclusive or separate forms of church government were abandoned some thirty years ago, so that now the work of church extension is carried on the same as in all other evangelical denominations. It admits new converts by the rite of confirmation and will receive members from other evangelical churches on certificate. The cardinal points of Moravian doctrines and teaching are the same as those held in common by the evangelical bodies. In Baptism, the Lord's supper, belief in the conscious existence of the soul after death, the Moravians are in perfect accord with Protestant churches everywhere. They emphasize that it is of the greatest importance to have Christ in the heart and life a life of faith, love and piety. They are not inclined to call any man master, no matter, whether he be a Luther, Zinzendorf, Calvin or Wesley, but accept and acknowledge the Savior as guide and master of all.
Not only does the old records of the Moravian church at Dover show the time when grandfather and wife became members, but also gives dates when their children were christened and confirmed.
The minutes show that on December 31, 1849, a church election was held in which Jacob Bippus was chosen to take the place of Israel Ricksecker as an official of the church and clothed with Authority and power to act in any official capacity within the organization.
It is diverting to mention that the old records contain this paragraph:
"At the fourth session held June 15, 1845, the following resolution was adopted: 'Resolved that the sexton keep a list of the male heads of families, arranging them according to age, ly to each member for one pound of tallow candles for lighting the church.'"
The last mention of the name of Jacob Bippus appeared on the records of December 31, 1952, indicating that in the following year, 1853, the family moved to Huntington county, Ind. The writer is informed by an age pioneer that the Rev. Galster, a brother-in-law of the senior Mr. Bippus, came to Indiana in 1852 and bargained for land in Warren township, a quarter section of which was for the Bippus family, who came in 1853, all except the son, George J., who remained in Dover two months to complete his term of apprenticeship in the trade of a tinsmith, which he learned rom John Rex, an early resident of Dover. Records of Huntington county indicate that on September 28, 1859, Allen Barnett executed a warranty deed to the Bippuses for the southwest quarter of section twenty-three, in Warren township, the consideration having been $720. A grandson, Charles Bippus and John Lowman now reside on separate eighties which made up the original Bippus estate.
Christian Spath, a ninety-year-old pioneer, who passed most of his life in the Bippus neighborhood, states that in the spring of 1853 he was given the contract to clear ten acres of land for Jacob Bippus at $8.25 per acre. He was at work in the clearing when George J. Bippus arrived from Ohio, having walked out from town after arrival on a canal boat. Mr. Spath recites that young Mr. Bippus took a hand in the work, helping to chop and pile brush until his tender hands were blistered. Next day he walked to Huntington and procured employment in George Corlew's tin shop.
For many years Jacob Bippus and wife were highly esteemed residents of Warren township. There having been no Moravian church in this part of the state, Mr. and Mrs. Bippus placed their membership with the German Evangelical church society. It is said Mr. Bippus built the St. John's frame church which once stood a short distance west of Bippus near the old cemetery along which passes the Erie railway. The old church was removed after a new brick edifice was built on the West side of Bippus in 1897. Mr. and Mrs. Jacob Diering are among old members of that church who are still living witnesses to the fact that Jacob Bippus was not only an ideal citizen, but an exemplary member of the church whose ability was such that he was drafted by the membership to occupy the pulpit and offer comment on certain passages of Scripture at times when the pastor could not be present. The wife of Jacob Bippus died on December 4, 1884. The husband followed on April 13, 1888, at the age of eighty years. Both are buried in the little graveyard west of Bippus.
An incident closely linked with the passing of Grandfather Bippus is recalled by friends in the old neighborhood. The old gentleman had been to the village to buy some window panes. On his way home he stopped at the Lowman home and chatted pleasantly after a few minutes. When leaving he smilingly said: "I must go home now and put these window lights in a sash. When this is done I'm going to quit work. It will be the last job I will undertake." The sequel proved that his words were prophetic. They seemed to have been a presentiment of what soon followed. When reaching the homestead where he was living with the Matt Bippus family, he must the glass in the sash as planned, entered the home and went to his room. When called to dinner he failed to respond. When the daughter-in-law went to see what was delaying him, his familiar figure, in sitting posture, in his rocking chair, his spectacles in place and a newspaper in his hand, all looked natural, but the light of his life had gone out. His work was done. He had fought his course and kept the faith. At the day's noontide hour he had quietly slipped away into the brightness of eternal day.
Published in The Huntington Herald (Huntington, Indiana), 7 August 1928, Tuesday, Page 26