Michael Jacobs was an American Lutheran clergyman and educator.
Background
Jacobs was born on January 18, 1808, in Waynesboro, Pennsylvania, the son of Henry and Anna Maria (Miller) Jacobs. His grandfather, Martin Jacob, emigrated in 1753 from Preursdorf in Alsace, settling first in Frederick County, Maryland, but later pushing into the wilderness of Washington County, Pennsylvania. He gave a portion of his land for a church and a school, the locality thence gaining the name of Jacob's Church. Michael Jacobs' mother died in 1810 and his father, a farmer, in 1822, leaving the boy to be reared by relatives.
Education
Jacobs entered the preparatory department of Jefferson College at Canonsburg, Pennsylvania, in 1823 and graduated second in the class of 1828.
Career
For a short time Jacobs taught in a boarding school at Belair, Maryland, but in April 1829 he went to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, to assist his elder brother David at the Gettysburg Gymnasium. In 1832, when the school was reorganized as Pennsylvania (now Gettysburg) College, Michael was elected professor of mathematics and natural sciences and held this post until his retirement, because of failing health, in 1866. In 1832, having read theology privately, he was licensed by the West Pennsylvania Synod. In his doctrinal opinions he was a whole-hearted conservative; his only recorded outburst of indignation occurred on his reading S. S. Schmucker's Definite Platform. Although modest and even diffident, he exercised a strong influence over his pupils and eventually over a good part of the General Synod of the Lutheran Church. His scientific attainments, considering his isolation and straitened circumstances, were respectable. He constructed most of the physical and chemical apparatus that he used, won something more than local celebrity as a meteorologist, and succeeded, about 1845, in preserving fruit by canning. This process, although it had been used in France for some twenty years, was then unknown in rural Pennsylvania. His Notes on the Rebel Invasion of Maryland and Pennsylvania and the Battle of Gettysburg (Philadelphia, 1864; 7th ed. , Gettysburg, 1909) was based on careful personal observation. He served three terms as president of the West Pennsylvania Synod and three terms as treasurer. After his retirement he continued to live in Gettysburg, enjoying his books and his garden until a few days before his death, which occured on July 22 1871.
Achievements
Connections
On May 3, 1833, Jacobs married Julianna M. Eyster of Harrisburg.