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Page 104 JOHN RUMBARGER
While these springs have disappeared on the surface, they are still
in existence, being covered by buildings and the water being carried
off by underground sewers. The land in the central part of the city
has been raised and filled. However, when Mr. Rumbarger invited the
people to buy lots, this was the character of the country and so
existed for many years. Stumps stood in streets and alleys and on
the lots purchased.
One can imagine what the roads passing through this
territory were like in wet weather, and that will be more fully
described hereafter.
The population of Brady Township in 1860 was 1687. In
1870, three years after the Pomroy Map, the population of Brady
Township was 2,009. After the second advertisement, Dr. W. A.
Smathers, a young physician of twenty-two years of age, decided that
Rumbarger was the place for him to locate and on the loth of June
1873, purchasing a lot on South Main Street, he built an office,
still owned by his family, and commenced the practice of medicine.
Dr. Smathers tells us that at the time he came in 1873, there were
sixteen families within the present limits of the City of DuBois.
The manufacturing enterprises were a blacksmith shop and a shoe
maker's shop. The merchandising was confined to one general store
and a peanut stand.
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