Harshbarger line: Hans Huber 1662-1750

 Hans Huber was the immigrant in this line, and he was a Mennonite.  That much seems certain.  Other than that, there is quite a bit that is up for debate about him.  For instance, who were his parents?  There seem to be several theories, but based on geography, I have tentatively given his parents as Hans Jacob and Barbara Buman Huber.  This family comes from Hausen, Zurich, Switzerland.  Hans had at least three brothers and sisters, but his early life was probably difficult.  Mennonites at the time were despised by the Swiss authorities, and were not allowed to accumulate any wealth.  They also faced the constant thread of imprisonment, although I've not found a record that Hans was ever imprisoned for his religious beliefs.  Some of his neighbors and fellow worshipers likely were.  

Hans moved around quite a bit during the years before his immigration to America.  He is seen in Friedrichstadt, Germany Wesenmatt, and the Ibersheim in Hesse, but by 1700 Hans was back in Hausen.  The next ten years are fuzzy as to where he was.  He would likely have tried to stay in the background as much as possible.  Most sources think that Hans arrived in Pennsylvania in 1710, on board the "Mary and Lyon".  Hans Huber was a common name so it is hard to be sure, but there are records for a John Hoober in 1721 at Conestoga in Lancaster County.  Our Hans had a son named Jacob who was also listed in that tax record, and they were noted as being "Palatine", the area where many Mennonites lived for months or years before moving on to America.  

There is a good deal of debate, also, about Hans's wife.  It seems that wife number one died about the time son Jacob was born, and he then married wife number 2.  The second wife was Margaret Koch, and a slim majority of sites show her as the mother of Jacob, next in the line of descent.  The most common name I've seen for his first wife is Barbara Lier.  More research needs to be done to confirm whether there was one marriage or two, and if two, whether Jacob was the child of the first or the second wife.  Regardless, Margaret would have been the only mother Jacob ever knew. 

Hans is thought to have had between 6 and 14 children.  Six are mentioned in his will, son Jacob and 5 daughters.  Undoubtedly they were an industrious family.  Hans had land surveyed in 1735, 200 acres in Earl Township.  We have no way of knowing how long he had lived on the land before getting the survey that allowed the transaction to become legal.  He had an additional 150 acres surveyed in 1737.  By now, his children would have been grown and he had apparently reached some degree of prosperity, in order to purchase more land.  

He was either prosperous or generous, or both, because in his will he left money to the "poor of the people called Mennonists in Pennsylvania" and also to the poor of the "Mennonists at the place in Germany called Ibersheimerhof".  If his wife predeceased him he left money to the children of her sister, still in Germany.  He wrote the will February 17, 1746 and it was proven on October 23, 1750.  He's buried at the Groffdale Mennonite Brick Church Cemetery at Leola in Lancaster County, where a monument erected in 1928 stands.  Perhaps coincidentally, and perhaps not, 1928 is the year that his 7th great grandson, Herbert Hoover, was elected President of the United States.  

The line of descent is:

Hans Huber-Barbara or Margaret

Jacob Huber-Anna

Anna Elizabeth Huber-Jost Gingrich

Maria Gingrich-Adam Burkholder

Joseph Burkholder-Elizabeth Miller

Barbara Burkholder-Benjamin Buchtel

Nancy Fannue Buchtel-Adam Kemery

Della Kemery-William Withers

Goldie Withers-Grover Harshbarger

Cleveland Harshbarger-Mary Beeks