The Brush Mountain Mystery Grave

 

Bernard Lukehart and his dog Jack, Robert Leake, and an unidentified youth.

Late on the Wednesday afternoon of August 3, 1927, Bernard Lukehart of Altoona, and his sister Catherine, were picking huckleberries on Brush Mountain. The siblings brought along their beloved and loyal companion, a dog named Jack.

At around 4 o'clock the Lukeharts heard a mournful howl far up the mountainside. It was Jack, and it was a sound they had never heard the dog make before. Bernard and Catherine rushed through the underbrush in the direction of Jack's howls, and they found him pawing and scratching at a large mound of dirt and rocks the size and shape of an igloo. Amid the stones and soil they saw what looked like bones. Bernard and his sister began to dig alongside their dog, and, sure enough, the waning light of a summer day soon illuminated a human skeleton.

The children raced down the mountain, to the home of William Leake on Kettle Road. Mrs. Leake promptly notified the city police and Blair County coroner, while her son, Robert, hiked up Brush Mountain to guard the mysterious grave until authorities arrived. It was dark when Coroner Rothrock reached the wilderness grave, but he found the body so badly decomposed that he couldn't be certain of the age, race or gender. Because there was a part of a man's shoe and a scrap of cloth from a pair of trousers, the coroner concluded the victim had been male. Inside the grave were also found a .32-caliber revolver loaded with two unfired bullets, one discharged shell, a pocketwatch and a razor.

The remains were taken to the morgue for closer examination, where Coroner Rothrock discovered a bullet hole in the left temple skull. Meanwhile, the police were unable to find any clue to the man's identity, and there were no recent reports of missing persons. Authorities wondered if the remains were those of an unknown suicide victim-- perhaps a melancholy mountain hermit who had painstakingly constructed a rocky tomb before crawling inside and firing the fatal shot into his brain.

If such was the case, it wouldn't be the first time a hermit had made his home on Brush Mountain. Some locals still recalled Henry Briney, a Civil War veteran, who lived on Brush Mountain in the 1890s and was known for being rather demented. And then there was Michael Burket, who lived  just west of Altoona in a log hut near in the hills until his death in 1879. 

The best clue the authorities had in order to identify the mystery corpse was the man's watch. On Friday, the coroner took the watch to a jeweler to have it cleaned, hopeful that a maker's mark or a serial number could be located. Unfortunately, no such markings were found, leaving detectives, and Coroner Rothrock, baffled. Until further clues developed, the decision was made to display the remains, along with the items found inside the grave, at the Lafferty & Tobias Funeral Parlor, in the unlikely event that someone would recognize one of the gruesome artifacts.

 
Theories and Rumors

Naturally, rumors began to abound. There came a report that two women from Hollidaysburg had stumbled across the very same grave twenty years earlier, and had reported their find to the constable of Frankstown, just south of Brush Mountain. The constable went out in search of the grave but was unable to locate it. According to rumor, the same women stumbled across the same grave ten years later, but this time had kept the secret to themselves. 

The coroner dismissed this report, stating that time and the elements would've reduced the scrap of clothing found inside the grave to dust. This was a reasonable explanation; outside of a hot and dry environment like a desert or a mummy's tomb, cotton will decompose in as little as a few months, and linen can dissolve in a matter of weeks. Even wool, which can take up to five years to decompose, wouldn't have survived twenty years of harsh Pennsylvania winters and humid, blistering summers. The coroner also doubted that an igloo-shaped mound would go unnoticed for such a long period, as Brush Mountain was a popular destination for hunters and berry pickers.

Another popular rumor in Altoona was that the bones had belonged to a federal agent who had made the fatal mistake of stumbling across a moonshining operation. Those who believed in this theory pointed out that a .32-caliber revolver would've been more at home in the hands of a government agent than a mountain hermit or moonshiner, both of whom would've chosen to arm themselves with a rifle. Also casting some doubt on the suicide theory, though not disproving it, was the fact that the man had been shot in the left temple, which would have been more easily accomplished by a left-handed suicide victim. Yet authorities could find no evidence of any federal agents having disappeared in the mountains of Blair County.

The Jeweler's Tale

A new theory emerged on August 9 when the Altoona Tribune received a letter from John Hearn, a jeweler from Hollidaysburg. Hearn recalled that, about eighteen years earlier, a man from Frankstown by the name of Albert Mentzer had left him two high-quality watches to repair. One of the watches belonged to Mentzer's son, Charles, and the other was his own. Mentzer had told Hearn that he'd return for them the following week, but the jeweler never heard from him again.

"It seems to me he was on his way to Altoona to draw some money and met with foul play," said Hearn in his letter. "He told me he had quite a sum of money in the bank, and since he never turned up, John M. Snyder of Hollidaysburg was appointed executor of his estate." Hearn said that he turned over the watches to Snyder. He recalled that when Mentzer had dropped off the watches for repair, the weather was cool and he had been wearing an overcoat.

Although Albert Mentzer was never seen again, authorities discounted the jeweler's story, as the watch found in the grave was of a cheap variety. John Snyder was questioned and  he recalled the disappearance of Mentzer, which took place on Friday, April 5, 1907. He had never made it to Altoona to withdraw money from the bank, and, at the time of disappearance, his son was suspected of his murder. However, while there was no evidence to charge him with any crime-- as Albert Mentzer's body was never found-- the son was later arrested for larceny in the fall of 1907, after stealing shoes from the Frankstown Supply Company and selling them on the streets of Pittsburgh. He was sentenced to three years at Western Penitentiary, where he died of pneumonia a few months later in April of 1908.

Interestingly, Albert Mentzer lived on the floor above the Frankstown Supply Company.

The Mentzer Theory

Authorities scoffed at the idea that the man found in the burial mound on Brush Mountain was the long-lost Albert Mentzer, but it certainly seems possible. Surely, Mentzer would've found it handy to take with him a watch during his trip to Altoona, and with his "good" timepiece in the hands of John Hearn, this might explain why a cheap watch was found inside the grave.

Additionally, newspaper accounts of Mentzer's disappearance in 1907 stated that Mentzer told his son that he was going to Altoona for a few days, and that Charles had visited a sister on Tuesday, April 9, to look for him. How Charles spent his time between April 5 and April 9 is unknown, but its entirely possible that the grave could've been constructed in that time frame. If Charles Mentzer wanted to murder his father, he would've had a perfect opportunity to do so; he knew his father's plans, and he no doubt would've been familiar with the terrain, as the road from Frankstown to Altoona lies right at the foot of Brush Mountain. Maybe this explains why Charles decided to go to Pittsburgh just weeks after his father's disappearance. Records show that Charles had left Frankstown in mid-June. 

Is it possible that Albert Mentzer, who lived above the store from which the shoes had been stolen, had threatened to turn his son in for the robbery he had committed? If so, this would present the all-important motive for murder. But if Charles had ever buried a man under a pile of dirt and rocks on the craggy slopes of Brush Mountain, he went to his death without ever speaking a word of it.

Ultimately, the remains discovered by a dog named Jack were laid to rest in an unmarked grave, and the residents of Altoona and Frankstown went about their lives, leaving behind not one, but two, unsolved mysteries.

 

Sources:

Altoona Tribune, Apr. 29, 1908.
Altoona Tribune, Aug. 4, 1927.
Altoona Tribune, Aug. 5, 1927.
Altoona Tribune, Aug. 6, 1927.
Altoona Tribune, Aug. 9, 1927.