The Mystery Corpse of the Pinnacle

Police sketch of man found inside Berks County cave

 

UPDATE: The mystery has been solved! On 8/27/27, authorities announced that they have identified the man as Nicholas Paul Grubb of Montgomery County.

The craggy peak known as "The Pinnacle", the highest point in Berks County, is steeped in legends and myths dating back centuries. The native Lenape, who referred to the boulder-capped summit as "Kanteele", or "battlement", were said to have practiced human sacrifices there in ancient times. To early Pennsylvania Dutch settlers, the peak was known as "Zinne-kup" (or Zinne-kop), and was largely avoided because it was believed to be the gathering place of witches. In more recent times, hikers and campers have claimed to have seen unexplained sights and to have heard unexplained sounds in the vicinity of the Pinnacle.

One of the more baffling mysteries concerning this well-known geological wonder didn't happen in the distant past, however, but in January of 1977, when the frozen body of a young man was discovered in a cave near the Pinnacle. What makes this mystery truly strange is that the victim's identity remains unknown, despite numerous personal belongings found on the body and several distinguishing physical features.

A State of Extreme Emergency

Weather records were shattered in January of 1977, and the severe cold steak forced Governor Milton J. Shapp to declare a "state of extreme emergency" in an effort to conserve heating fuel. Across the western part of the state, gas was shut off to businesses and factories in order to free up supply for residential use and schools were ordered to close. In Erie, Mayor Joseph Robie asked residents to turn their thermostats down to 55 degrees; all business except for drugstores and grocery stores were urged to shut down. Making matters worse, ice-choked rivers threatened to spill over their banks. In many parts of the state, above-freezing temperatures hadn't been seen since mid-December.

Things were nearly as bleak in Berks County, where below-zero temperatures kept most residents indoors. On January 17, temperatures of nine below zero were recorded in Reading, beating the city's all-time low for that date by a full eleven degrees. The mercury dipped to ten below zero in Lake Ontelaunee; in Rehrersburg, it dropped to fourteen below. And that wasn't even taking wind chill into consideration.

That anyone would be outside in such dangerously cold weather was unimaginable. That anyone should be out hiking was unbelievable. And yet, despite the weather, hikers still hiked the stretch of Appalachian Trail in Albany Township, and it was on this stretch, near Lookout Rock, where two hikers found the body of an unidentified male inside a cave near the summit of Blue Mountain at approximately 3:00 on the afternoon of Sunday, January 16. 

State Police at Hamburg were notified of the discovery at 4:45 pm, and rescue crews were dispatched to the scene, which was accessible only by foot, to retrieve the frozen corpse. The body was taken to Reading Hospital, were it was hoped that an identification could be made. An autopsy was scheduled for the following day, when it was learned that the man's blood type was O positive, and that he bore a distinctive T-shaped scar on the left side of his chin.

According to the State Police, the man, who was believed to have been a hiker perhaps seeking refuge from the bitter weather, was a white male between 23 and 27. However, no hiking or camping gear was found near the body. There were no signs of foul play. 

The man was 5'10" in height and weighed 155 pounds. He had long curly reddish-brown hair, a full beard, blue eyes, and was dressed in a size 38 dark brown suede buckskin jacket with leather tassels and a pair of blue Wrangler slacks with a 30-inch waist. On his feet were brown leather hiking boots, size 10-10.5, with black Vibram soles. On his finger he wore a 14-karat gold ring with a blue stone.

Assuming that this blue stone was a birthstone, that would've given authorities a presumable birth month of March, September or December. But there were other clues which should've made identification a cinch; beneath his jacket he wore a brown knit turtleneck sweater with the label "Jules Pilch- Doylestown/Hatboro". Jules Pilch was a fashionable men's clothing store with locations in Bucks and Montgomery counties. He was also wearing military-issue underwear, with laundry mark B-0654.

Although no vehicle was found near the Appalachian Trail, it would appear that the man had planned on going somewhere on foot; founded in 1937, Vibram was (and still is) a popular Italian company that made rubber soles for more than one thousand different footwear manufacturers, most of which catered to hikers, mountain-climbers and other outdoorsmen.

View from atop The Pinnacle

 

But where did he come from? Since no abandoned vehicle was found in the vicinity, this means he was either a local (doubtful, as there were no missing persons fitting his description from Berks or Schuylkill counties), or had been driven to the Hamburg area by someone else. Could he have been a hitchhiker? It's almost certain that he hadn't hiked a considerable distance on foot like Appalachian Trail hikers attempting to conquer large stretches of trail. After all, no camping equipment-- not even a backpack or a change of clothing-- was found on Blue Mountain. To me, this suggests that he was a hitchhiker. The locale bolsters this theory; Hamburg is conveniently located at the crossroads of two major highways, I-78, which runs east to west, and Route 61, which runs north to south. If this man had come from Bucks or Montgomery counties, as the label in his sweater suggests, it would've been a mere 70-90 minute car or truck ride to the trailhead leading to the Pinnacle.

While authorities received calls from across the country regarding missing persons who might fit the description, every tip led to a dead end. Ultimately, the Blue Mountain mystery corpse was buried in an unmarked grave at the Berks County Almshouse Cemetery in Cumru Township.

Can You Crack the Case?

The laundry mark, I believe, is perhaps the biggest clue. At first glance, this may suggest an urban bachelor or apartment-dweller, as laundry marks were used by commercial laundry establishments to identify clothing which customers had dropped off. However, laundry marks were also used by the military. 

According to one post I was able to locate on a military forum, army laundry markd from that era consisted of the first letter of the soldier's last name followed by the last four numbers of his/her Army Serial Number. Of course, considering that every branch of the military has its own serial numbering system (not to mention the National Guard), and that the military has been issuing serial numbers since WW1, there are probably hundreds of soldiers who could've had the same laundry mark during the time period of 1976-77.

On the previously-mentioned military forum, one person posted a similar query in an attempt to identify the owner of an antique army helmet from the 10th Mountain Division he had purchased. One of the replies sums up just how difficult it would be to attach a name to a laundry mark:

I ran some queries against a database I have listing 31, 804 soldiers from the 10th Mountain Division and its precursor units. There were 2,402 duplicate laundry marks, 186 laundry marks that appeared three times, 13 that appeared four times, and one (S-8291 ) that was repeated five times. Imagine how many times a given laundry mark will appear in a database with more than 9 million records.

Yes, matching the B-0654 laundry mark to a name would be a daunting task indeed. Daunting, but not impossible. Even if there are hundreds of duplicates, how many of them had Type O positive blood, a T-shaped scar on their chin, lived or shopped in the Philadelphia area and had a probable birth month of March, September, or December?



Sources:

Reading Eagle, Jan. 16, 1977.
Allentown Morning Call, Jan. 17, 1977.
Reading Eagle, Jan. 18, 1977.
Allentown Morning Call, Jan. 23, 1977.
Lebanon Daily News, March 2, 1977.