The story begins with a Jacob Marburger, a 19 year old Washington College student, who was the victim of a prank on campus. Other students had put a garbage full of water outside of his dorm room so that when he opened the door it killed into his room. Two days later Marburger, who was a year into antique gun collecting, brandished an unloaded gun in front of other students while he was intoxicated. Two weeks later he was suspended from the school and upon returning after his suspension he was kicked out of his fraternity and had to resign from student government.

Jacob was reported missing when he left campus early Sunday, November 15th, and drove to his home in Cheltenham, Pennsylvania. He arrived at home at 3am that Monday but left shortly after at 4 am and took a rifle case with him. His pinged phone then spotted him at a Walmart at 7 am on the 16th in Hamburg, PA. At the Wal-Mart, which is 15 minutes away from Hawk Mountain, he bought five rounds of ammunition. Jacob Marburger was found dead after a self inflicted gunshot wound in his car at a picnic area at Hawk Mountain Sanctuary.

This story was brought to my attention by my father last night when he asked me how our trip went to Hawk Mountain went. He mentioned this story and I figured I would look it up. I found this opening paragraph by NBC 10 Philadelphia especially interesting: 

“Jacob Marberger picked a peaceful place to die. The Washington College student whose disappearance prompted his school to shut down for two weeks shot himself in the head at Hawk Mountain Sanctuary, a natural area with beautiful vistas and landscape, authorities said. The famous terrain, which sits alongside the Appalachian Trial in Berks County, Pennsylvania, is the world’s first refuge for birds of prey.”

I wondered why they went so in depth about Hawk Mountain before telling the story of why Marberger may have committed suicide. But I also wondered why Marberger chose Hawk Mountain as his last place to be alive.

From reading a few reports on what happened it seems as though bullying played a large role in Jacob’s death, including the involvement of the anonymous posting app Yik-Yak. It is horrific to think that bullying could have brought this student to commit suicide but I also can’t help but think that access to guns played a role in this suicide as well. Visiting Cabela’s opened my eyes to the issue of access to firearms and had I never visited I may have looked at this story as solely a result of bullying. But now I wonder if Jacob had not been allowed to purchase firearms or at least not purchase bullets so easily at a Walmart, maybe there would have been more time to stop him. Granted owning a gun didn’t make Jacob feel the way he did and bullying is the cause here but maybe the access to firearms is making things worse as thoughts of suicide can quickly become a reality for some.

Here are the two articles that I looked at incase you would like to read more:

http://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/Jacob-Marberger-Suicide-Washington-College-Hawk-Mountain-Cheltenham-352949961.html

http://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/Jacob-Margerger-Death-Self-Inflicted-Gunshot-Wound-352746651.html