The First Barefoot Reunion

Front Row: Mary (Barefoot) Watkins, Loraine (Walker) Barefoot, Mary Jane (Edwards) Barefoot, George Barefoot, Samuel Barefoot, John Barefoot, Timothy Taylor, William Barefoot, Irvin Taylor. Row 2: Ross Barefoot, Della Clark Barefoot, James Reininger, Charles Stanton, David Hammer, William Taylor, James Hammer. Last Row: Albert Barefoot, Ford Hammer, Blaine Barefoot, James Barefoot. FIRST BAREFOOT REUNION TOOK PLACE AT OSTERBURG, PA, ON 17 AUGUST 1918 Unlike a birthday in which age begins as one after the first year, a reunion starts at one the first time it meets. Thus our 2017 reunion marks the 100th meeting of the Barefoot Clan. Here’s information about the first Barefoot Reunion: “Famous Picnic Grounds Selected on Account of Convenience.” The Barefoots and descendants will hold their first family reunion and basket picnic Saturday, August 17, at the famous Osterburg picnic grounds at Osterburg. While this is intended to be a big social gathering of this widely known family, arrangements for addresses by prominent descendants of the early settlers of that name have have been made. Among the speakers the committee has selected are ex-Mayor Joseph Cauffiel of Johnstown, Elliot Reininger of Blair County, Attorney Charles Barefoot of Cleveland, O., and others. Music will be furnished by a brass band, and amusements of all kinds will be arranged, a merry-go-round to be one of the features of the day. The Osterburg grounds are beautiful, well adapted and equipped to all weather conditions, and are most convenient for those wishing to go by trail. The committee concluded to hold its first reunion there, instead of on the old Barefoot farm. The grounds are easily accessible to autoists, and many other conveyances. Trains from Bedford and Altoona pass twice daily – 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. W. S. Barefoot, a well-known liveryman in the pioneer days of Windber, is president of the reunion association. The second Barefoot Reunion Association outing was held Saturday, August 16, 1919, on the Job Barefoot picnic grounds at Pleasantville, Bedford County. W. S. Barefoot was president.