Nearly 50 years after being found dead in a Pennsylvania cave, ‘Pinnacle Man’ is identified

The body of a man found frozen in a small Pennsylvania cave nearly 50 years ago has finally been identified.

The remains of Nicholas Paul Grubb, 27, of Fort Washington, were discovered in January 1977 by two hikers who had ducked inside the cave to escape some inclement weather. Grubb has long been known as the “Pinnacle Man,” a reference to the Appalachian mountain peak near where his body was found.

An autopsy at the time found no signs of foul play and determined that he died from a drug overdose. Authorities, though, could not identify Grubb’s body from his appearance, belongings, clothing or dental information. Fingerprints were collected during his autopsy but somehow were misplaced, according to the Berks County Coroner’s Office.

Detectives from the state police and investigators with the coroner’s office had periodically revisited the case over the past 15 years and Grubb’s body was exhumed in August 2019 after dental records linked him to two missing person cases in Florida and Illinois.

DNA samples did not match in either case, but a break came last month in when a Pennsylvania state trooper found Grubb’s missing fingerprints. Within an hour of submitting the card to the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System, a FBI fingerprint expert matched them to Grubb.

A relative of Grubb was notified of the discovery and family members asked the coroner’s office to place his remains in a family plot.