Gustav C. Franck

 

For many years Gustav C. Franck has been successfully engaged as a carriage and wagon maker, later taking up contracting and building and also engaging in the coal business, but since 1912 he has been connected with agricultural pursuits in Linton township, although he is still interested in his former line of business. He has turned to agriculture in order to give his sons the benefit of an outdoor life and healthful farm surroundings. Born at Carondelet, Missouri, August 4, 1860, Gustav C. Franck is a son of Martin and Mary (Arpe) Franck. The father was born in Bavaria, May 2, 1827, and the mother at Dobberan, grand duchy of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, December 9, 1837. The father crossed to America in the spring of 1850, first locating in New York city, where he engaged as a cabinet-maker and carpenter. Later he went to Clinton, Iowa and Dubuque, subsequently removing from there to St. Louis and thence to Springfield, Illinois. After remaining here for a time he went to Kankakee that state and lastly to Chicago, where ended his active career, passing away in 1909, being engaged in his business until a week before his death, despite his advanced age of eighty-two years. The mother passed away in 1903. The were the parents of five children, of whom our subject is the second in order of birth.

Gustav C. Franck attended school in Springfield and Kankakee, Illinois. At the age of seventeen, in 1877, he was apprenticed to a carriage and wagon maker for four years and then followed that trade for any equal period of time in Chicago. He then engaged in the coal business until 1912, when he came to his present farm in order to afford his sons a better opportunity for leading an outdoor life and to realize some ideas and ideals which he had formed in the city. Although he is now largely interested in farming, he is still connected with his former business in partnership with his son, Walter C. Franck, their establishment being in Oak Park, Illinois.

On August 27, 1883, Mr. Franck married Miss Hulda Gueneman, who was born in Westphalia, Germany, March 17, 1863. Her mother died when she was but six years of age and she was reared by an uncle in the old country. Mrs. Franck came to America in 1881 and until her marriage made her home in Chicago. By her marriage she became the mother of four children: Walter C., who was born June 21, 1884, and who is engaged in the contracting business at Oak Park, Illinois; Arthur L., who was born September 20, 1887, and who resides with his father; Hulda, who was born July 5, 1889, and who married J. L. Berger, a cutter in the employ of Hart, Schaffner & Marx of Chicago; and Elmer, who was born January 29,1898, and who resides at home.

Mr. Franck is a member of the Evangelical Association and his family has also been reared in that faith. He gives his adherence to the republican party but has never cared for public office. Fraternally he is a member of the blue lodge of Masons Of Oak Park. Mr. Franck is a progressive and aggressive business man and no doubt will be as successful along agricultural lines as he has been in commercial life. He has distinctive ideas of his own and intends to try out some of them which have occurred to him as practical. His advent among the farming fraternity of Linton township, Allamakee county, must be considered fortunate as no doubt he will take a leading part in promoting agricultural development in the section and in establishing new standards and in contributing to the prosperous conditions that prevail.

-source: Past & Present of Allamakee County; by Ellery M. Hancock; S. J. Clarke Pub. Co.; 1913
-transcribed by Diana Diedrich

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