BIO: Frederick KELKER, Dauphin County, PA

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Commemorative Biographical Encyclopedia of Dauphin County, 
Containing Sketches of Representative Citizens, and Many of the 
Early Scotch-Irish and German Settlers.  Chambersburg, Pa.: 
J. M. Runk & Company, 1896, page 205.
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  KELKER, FREDERICK, son of Anthony Kelker and Mary Magdalena Meister, 
was born October 29, 1780.  His early education was extremely limited, 
and consisted of a few months' attendance at the parochial school in 
the churchyard of the Reformed church at Lebanon.  In May, 1801, he 
entered the store of Oves & Moore, and in March, 1805, removed to 
Harrisburg, where in partnership with his former employers, he 
established that town the first exclusively hardware store.  In 1811 he 
purchased the interest of his partners and became the sole owner.  In 
1823, his health failing, he relinquished business and disposed of it 
to two of the young men who had been in his employ.  He continued, 
however, to reside in the house in which he first settled until his 
decease.  Through all that period he manifested great interest in the 
welfare of his successors in business, and there was perhaps no year in 
which a portion of his capital was not to a greater or less extent used 
by them whenever they desired it.  He was remarkable for punctuality 
and integrity.  A close observer of human nature and a safe counselor, 
being often appealed to by his fellow-citizens, calm and modest in his 
demeanor, he was not to be swerved from his purposes when he felt that 
he was in the line of duty.  His habits of industry and economy led to 
the acquisition of a competency, and the latter half especially of his 
long life was devoted in his own quiet and unobtrusive way to the 
amelioration of the condition of the poor, sick and friendless.  In the 
vigor of manhood he filled many minor positions in the community in 
which he lived, always rejecting political preferment.  For several 
terms he was a member and president of the borough council; was a 
director of the branch established by the Philadelphia Bank in 
Harrisburg, a director of the Harrisburg Bank, a director of the common 
schools when they were first established in Pennsylvania, and was ready 
at all times to co-operate with his fellow-citizens in all the 
benevolent enterprises of the day.  In the church of which he was a 
member (the Reformed), he was prominent; presided at the meeting on 
November 17, 1820, to establish the first Sunday-school in connection 
with the church, and active in the measures adopted for erecting the 
church building yet standing.  He died at Harrisburg on July 12, 1857, 
in the seventy-seventh year of his age.  Mr. Kelker was twice married; 
first to Lydia Chamberlain, daughter of Charles Chamberlain, of 
Philadelphia; secondly to Catharine Fager, daughter of John and Sarah 
Fager, of Harrisburg.