Frank Karper, Sr.
 
Frank Karper was born Franz Korber in Lindenberg, Bavaria on December 27, 1827 to Joseph and Rosina (Schoenung) Koerber. His name was "Americanized" to Karper on passing through immigration in New York. On November 1, 1849 at age 21 he married Salomea Kolbenschlag (age 24) also of Lindenberg. Daughter Frances was born on January 9, 1850. They came to America in 1854 aboard the ship Mary Adeline, it took six weeks and they arrived in New York on January 11, 1855. Mary Frances Karper was born in Alliance, Ohio on February 6,1856
 
There luck on arrival was poor. There luggage was lost or stolen and they had only the clothes on their backs. They bought tickets to Cleveland because Frank had been promised a weaving job there. Their money ran out by the time they reached Freedom (later Alliance) Ohio. They got off the train hoping to buy some food for the baby with their last nickel at a rooming house. The proprietor happened to be German and offered them work.

Frank worked as a  blacksmith and carpenter. He was 33 when the Civil War began and had three small children but felt obligated to enlist. He fought with the 65th regiment of the Ohio volunteer infantry of Sherman's Brigade. His health deteriorated after the battle of Corinth and was transferred to the field hospital in Corinth and medically discharged on Jay 24, 1862. He received a veteran's pension of $8 a month initially and eventually $14 a month. He returned home and worked as a carpenter. In 1885 he loaned $300 to his son-in-law, Pat Scanlon III to buy a two story frame house which contained both living quarters and a grocery store which the Scanlon's ran. He died on September 20, 1900 at the age of 72.
see 1890 veterans records here and 1880 census, 1870 census,