This article is one in a series of articles about what life looks like in Butler County ahead of the nation’s 250th anniversary on July 4, 2026. Stories in this series aim to showcase what it’s like to live, work, play and serve in Butler County during this moment in history.

At 10 years old, Destiny Manchester Jeffers accidentally drove a car into her grandparents’ porch.

Sitting on her grandmother’s lap and steering up the driveway, their feet tangled as she tried to hit the brake pedal. Instead, she hit the gas. The car smashed into the porch, damaging bricks, wires and the coal chute beneath the house.

Terrified, she walked inside to face her grandfather.

“Did you just hit my house?” Rodney “Pap” Rhodaberger asked.

“Yes, Pap,” she replied.

“Are you OK?” he asked.

When she said, “yes,” that was the end of it.

The moment still captures the kind of man Rhodaberger has been to Jeffers and her siblings — a steady, forgiving father figure through a childhood shaped by responsibility, hardship and the close-knit chaos of a large Butler County family.

Now, as Rhodaberger battles glioblastoma, an aggressive brain cancer, at age 69, that same family — along with hundreds of friends, neighbors and community members — has rallied around the man who his granddaughter says, “always keeps his word and would do anything for anyone.”

Despite hardships of his own, family members say Rhodaberger has remained the steady center of a sprawling family that includes seven children, 31 grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.

Jeffers, 24, is the oldest of six biological children and three adopted siblings raised by her mother Christine Manchester, in rural Butler County. Manchester is one of Rhodabergers’ seven children.

Responsibility came early.

She describes herself as an “old soul,” a title she earned early in life while becoming, as she put it, “big sis and second mom all at the same time.”

Jeffers often helped care for younger siblings, even waking during the night to feed her baby sister, Heidi.

“She was actually my baby,” said Jeffers, smiling.

Her mom agreed that her daughter acted as Heidi’s mom. “But I gave birth to her,” she said.

Jeffers’ childhood included periods of financial hardship while her father struggled with alcoholism and addiction and was often absent from the home. The family moved between their home and the Rhodabergers’ before eventually losing their home in a 2017 fire. There were times when utilities were shut off and money for extras simply did not exist.

But they were also a loving and close family.

“When you grow up in a small house with so many siblings, you have no choice but to be close,” Jeffers said.

Still, their closeness could not always overcome the difficulties of poverty.

“We really struggled,” she said.

She remembers classmates at Butler High School getting iPods, cellphones and new electronics while she and her brother waited until age 15 to receive their first phones — something their mother worked hard to provide so they could call home for rides from sports practices and activities and keep in touch on band trips.

“My mom worked her butt off,” Jeffers said. “When we got them for Christmas, I bawled my eyes out.”

Still, she said her mother made sure her children experienced joy together and with their extended family and was always on the lookout for free activities. They packed picnic lunches for trips to Moraine State Park and camped on family farmland where aunts, uncles and cousins gathered — sometimes nearly 100 people with campers and tents spread across the property.

She said she remains grateful for her large extended family.

“I do think it makes it more fun, even though you struggle when you’re young,” she said. “But you’re never lonely.”

In her later teen years, Jeffers and her now-husband, Aidan Jeffers, started a family of their own. Today, they are raising two young daughters, Hallie 5, and Elia, 3. When their grandfather’s health declined, the couple knew they couldn’t wait for the big church wedding that Destiny always dreamed of.

So, they married in May at the Rhodabergers’ home.

“We had a super small wedding, actually in my Pap’s garage, but just my immediate family because we wanted Pap to be able to walk me down the aisle,” Jeffers said.

“It was just really, really important that he was able to walk me down the aisle, so we made it work.”

Still, Jeffers’ family has remained active in St. Wendelin Parish in Carbon Center, and a larger church ceremony is already on the calendar for next year — a longtime wish she isn’t giving up on.

Jeffers is now finishing her final semester in the accelerated program at UPMC Jameson School of Nursing in New Castle and will graduate in December.

She decided to pursue nursing after a difficult experience: serious complications following the birth of her second daughter, and the kindness shown to her by a nurse who comforted her before surgery.

“You’re going to be OK. We’ve done this a hundred times. You’re safe. We’ve got you.”

“I want to be that nurse for someone,” Jeffers said.

Even now, as the family keeps vigil around their grandfather’s illness, they find themselves flooded with memories – such as Fat Tuesdays, the day before Ash Wednesday gatherings where everyone gorged on pastries and drinks. Impromptu chicken wing dinners on a Sunday afternoon, thrown together in minutes, always drew 30 or 40 people.

And on May 16, nearly 1,000 people turned out for a fundraiser that his granddaughters planned at Happy Hunters’ Sportsman’s Club in Donegal Township to help Rhodaberger’s wife, Josie, after his passing — a testament, his family says, to the life he built and to the many friends he has made along the way.

Jeffers said her grandfather spent much of the day smiling, talking with friends, relatives and community members who came to the fundraiser, clearly energized by the overwhelming turnout.

The family feels grateful when they remember the many camping trips with extended family members over the years and especially the recent Memorial Day weekend when they all showed up at the Rhodaberger’s house to “camp” since he wasn’t well enough to go on a “real camping” trip this year.

It all goes back to the good fortune of having a lot of people to call family and the memories they share.

“Being in a big family, you might not have everything you want, but you will always have everything you need,” said Jeffers.