BIO: George ZIMMERMAN, 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, pages 240-241.
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  ZIMMERMAN, GEORGE, son of Henry and Barbara (Greiner) Zimmerman, born 
February 11, 1819, on the forth acre tract set apart from the original 
Greiner estate in Lower Swatara township, Dauphin county.  He attended 
the old Neidich meeting-house school in Churchville as well as other 
schools in Highspire, where the distillery now is, then taught by 
Conrad Alleman.  When he was five years old, his father purchased the 
Kerr estate, to which he removed with his family in the spring of 1825.  
His father died when he was but twenty years of age, and in 1842 he and 
his brother Henry farmed the home place as partners; but in December, 
1843, he married Barbara Stoner, daughter of Henry and Martha (Alleman) 
Stoner, and in the spring of 1844 they dissolved partnership, when he 
entered the lumber business in Highspire with Jacob Nissley.
  After the death of his father-in-law in 1847 he purchased the 
properties of the Stoner estate in Highspire.  In 1848 he sold his 
interest to his partner and entered a partnership with his brother 
Philip in Middletown at the "point." His wife died August 16, 1850, 
with whom he had four children:  Henry, born December 29, 1844; 
Augustus and Joseph, twins, born July 29, 1846, the latter of whom died 
in infancy; and Mary, born August 14, 1848.
  In 1852 he married Miss Elizabeth Meck, of Perry county, with whom he 
had four children, born in Dauphin county, as follows:  Milton, March 
18, 1853, Simon, October 18, 1853, Araminta, April 29, 1856, and Alice, 
February 18, 1858.  He continued with his brother in the lumber 
business, until the mill burned down, when in 1854 he began the brick 
business along the river above Highspire.  In this business he suffered 
many reverses through the panic of 1857, but finally survived that 
great commercial depression.  In the spring of 1859, attracted by the 
brilliant prospects of the then unsettled West, and also by the fact 
that his brothers Isaac and Simon, and his sisters Elizabeth and Mary, 
had migrated to Ohio, caused him to remove to that new country to try 
his fortune there.  We here take leave of his various achievements by 
the simple statement that he has collected about him a beautiful tract 
of 320 acres of fertile land, near Springfield, Ohio, and has erected 
thereon a fine brick mansion, large eastern style barns, and commodious 
out-buildings.  Having gotten his experience by battling with the stern 
realities of life, his nature partook of his surroundings, and he was 
very naturally a matter-of-fact man; life to him was a stern reality; 
he viewed it in the light of his real experience and was devoid of 
anything that partook of the nature of shame or conventionalism.  He 
was very generous, but when a kindness was bestowed, he was the first 
to forget it.  He is a sincere Republican in politics, and a consistent 
member of the U. B. Church.