Timeline

Two centuries at a glance

Lifespans on one scale, then the family's milestones set against the city's. Tap a bar or an event to open that person's page.

Lifespans, 1780 to today

16 lives · direct line in red · dashed lines mark milestones

1825 Erie Canal1834 Weppners arrive1901 Pan-American Expo1950 Peak population

Augustus Weppner1783–1869

Anna Maria Weppner Born1818–1889

Jacob Weppner1820–1902

Mathaeus Weppner1823–1832

Arnold Weppner1825–1903

Barbara Weppner Fougeron1831–1906

Francis Weppner1835–1909

Edward Albert Weppner1867–1914

Elmer Kraus Weppner1893–1961

Daniel Beyer Weppner1923–2004

Edward Charles Weppner1923–2009

Mary Louise Weppner1924–2002

Anne Theresa Weppner Fitzsimmons1926–2014

David Francis Weppner1929–2010

Benjamin H. Weppner1933–2021

Patricia Beyer Weppner1937–2005

17801805183018551880190519301955198020052030

1762
Family
Johann Adam Weppner marries Maria Anna Sabina Albert at Westhofen on 3 August.
1783
Family
Augustus Weppner is born at Westhofen, near Worms, and baptized on 7 December.
1791
Family
Augustus's sister Eva Magdalena marries Johann Philipp Born at Westhofen on 8 February.
1811
Family
Augustus marries Maria Margaretha Winter in Mainz. She dies the next year, aged twenty.
1818
Family
Anna Maria, Augustus and Barbara's first child, is born at Zell on 10 July.
1820
Family
Jacob Weppner is born in Zell, Rhine-Bavaria, on 29 October.
1825
Buffalo
The Erie Canal opens, with Buffalo as its western terminus.
1825
Family
Arnold Weppner is born in Zell on 5 September.
1828
Family
John Weppner is born at Zell on 19 July.
1829
Family
The family moves from Zell to Pfeddersheim, near Worms.
1829
Buffalo
St. Louis Church is founded for the city's French, German and Irish Catholics.
1831
Family
Barbara Weppner is born at Pfeddersheim on 28 June.
1831
Family
Eva Magdalena Weppner Born dies at Westhofen on 18 June.
1832
Family
Mathaeus Weppner dies at Pfeddersheim, aged nine.
1832
Family
Friedrich Doll marries Maria Anna Steffan at Önsbach, in Baden, on 5 March; their daughter Blandina is born on 8 December.
1832
Buffalo
Buffalo is chartered as a city; cholera kills more than 120 people by July.
1834
Family
Augustus sells his farm at Pfeddersheim to the town's new Jewish congregation, which plans to build its synagogue there.
1834
Family
Blandina Doll, not yet two, lands at New York with her parents on 21 June and reaches Buffalo on 1 July.
1834
Family
The Weppners sail from Le Havre on the François I, land at New York on 23 August and reach Buffalo on 18 September.
1834
Buffalo
Cholera returns to a city of nearly 15,000, and people who can afford to leave do.
1835
Family
Francis Weppner is born on 23 June and christened at St. Louis Church, the only one of Augustus's children born in America.
1836
Family
Augustus opens a butcher business at Genesee and Ash streets.
1837
Buffalo
Der Weltbürger, Buffalo's first German-language newspaper, begins publishing.
1840
Family
Anna Maria Weppner marries her cousin Philip Born at St. Louis Church on 3 March.
1840
Family
Augustus's brother Arnold dies at Wehrheim, in the Taunus, on 21 June.
1842
Buffalo
A treaty gives up the Seneca's Buffalo Creek Reservation, which bordered the city.
1845
Family
The family meat market is established; Catherine Dantzer arrives from Alsace-Lorraine at about seven.
1845
Buffalo
The Elk Street Market opens; butchers come to fill most of its stalls.
1848
Family
Jacob marries Emma Lambert at St. Louis Church on 1 September.
1849
Family
Philip Born dies on 26 January, and Jacob leaves his father's meat business to run Born's brewery for his widowed sister.
1849
Family
Barbara Weppner marries Joseph Fougeron, a Niagara Street grocer, on 23 October.
1852
Family
Arnold marries Blandina Doll at St. Boniface Church on 17 February.
1853
Family
John Weppner marries Susanna Germain on 21 July.
1854
Family
August F. Weppner is born on 26 August.
1855
Buffalo
Nearly half of Buffalo's 74,000 residents are German-speaking.
1858
Family
Francis Weppner marries Catherine Dantzer on 16 February.
1858
Family
Barbara (Stumpf) Weppner dies on 17 September.
1859
Buffalo
German and French Catholics open the United German & French Cemetery.
1861
Family
John Weppner volunteers on 8 August and joins Company I of the 64th New York Infantry.
1862
Family
Arnold and Blandina's twins, Frank Arnold and Charles, are born on 3 April.
1862
Family
John Weppner is wounded at the Battle of Fair Oaks, Virginia, on 1 June.
1864
Family
John Weppner is taken prisoner at Reams Station, Virginia, on 25 August.
1865
Family
By March, John Weppner has died, either a prisoner at Salisbury, North Carolina, or in a Washington hospital after his release.
1865
Family
Jacob Weppner hands the Born brewery on to Gerhard Lang, the husband of Philip Born's daughter Barbara.
1866
Family
Frank Weppner joins the first board of the German Catholic Young Men's Association, later the Buffalo Catholic Institute.
1867
Family
Edward Albert Weppner is born on 15 March.
1867
Family
Friedrich Doll, Blandina's father, dies in Buffalo on 7 November.
1869
Family
Augustus Weppner dies on 14 March, at 85.
1870
Buffalo
German Jesuits found Canisius College.
1877
Family
August F. Weppner marries Carolina Becker, who dies four years later.
1878
Family
Pierre Morand Dantzer, Catherine's father, dies in Buffalo on 29 October.
1878
Family
August F. Weppner starts running the meat market at the spot where it still stood in 1898.
1888
Family
August F. Weppner marries Josephine Gebhard on 14 November.
1889
Family
Anna Maria Weppner Born dies at her home, 1104 Main Street, on 26 July.
1891
Family
Edward A. Weppner marries Delia E. Kraus on 29 April.
1893
Family
Elmer Kraus Weppner and Mary Louise Herger are born.
1896
Buffalo
The Ellicott Square Building opens, the largest office building in the world at the time.
1900
Family
Arnold Weppner's Sons pack beef and pork on Guilford Street, Francis runs the Weppner Provision Co., and August runs the Ellicott Square Market.
1900
Family
Edward A. Weppner is assistant cashier of the German Bank.
1900
Family
Arnold Weppner turns 75, and the family prints an announcement tracing its moves from Zell to Buffalo.
1901
Buffalo
The Pan-American Exposition; President McKinley is shot at the Temple of Music.
1902
Family
Jacob Weppner dies on 8 January after nearly 68 years in Buffalo.
1903
Family
Arnold Weppner dies at home, 1165 Main Street, on 14 March.
1904
Family
Cashier Edward A. Weppner exposes a Boston promoter's use of the German-American Bank. After a run on 1 December the bank survives, and on 11 December he is reinstated; The New York Times reports it the next day.
1904
Buffalo
The German Bank, controlled by the same Boston promoter, fails in December.
1909
Family
Francis Weppner dies on 17 February.
1910
Family
Blandina (Doll) Weppner dies on 13 October.
1914
Family
Edward Albert Weppner dies on 28 January, mourned by the city's newspapers.
1914
Family
Elmer K. Weppner graduates from Cornell University; two years later he completes the University of Buffalo's law course.
1915
Family
Catherine (Dantzer) Weppner dies on 27 December, survived by six sons and two daughters.
1916
Family
Raymond J. Weppner goes to the Mexican border with the 108th Infantry; he later serves overseas as a sergeant.
1918
Buffalo
The German-American Bank renames itself Liberty Bank.
1920
Family
Elmer Kraus Weppner marries Mary Louise Herger.
1923
Family
Edward Charles Weppner is born in Buffalo on 31 July.
1926
Family
Paul E. Weppner graduates from the University of Buffalo Law School.
1929
Family
David Francis Weppner is born on 25 August.
1930
Family
August F. Weppner, the retired meat dealer, dies on 13 October.
1933
Family
Benjamin H. Weppner, the youngest of five, is born.
1937
Family
Albert M. Weppner dies in Omaha, Nebraska.
1950
Buffalo
Buffalo's population peaks at 580,132.
1959
Buffalo
The St. Lawrence Seaway opens and shipping begins to bypass Buffalo.
1961
Family
Elmer Kraus Weppner dies.
1969
Family
Catherine Louisa “Nina” Weppner Frohe dies in Florida at ninety-nine.
1977
Family
Mary Louise (Herger) Weppner dies.
1986
Family
Dennis Michael Weppner earns his medical degree, the third generation of doctors in the family.
1989
Family
Dr. Edward Weppner retires after 35 years in practice.
2010
Family
Dr. David F. Weppner, chief of pediatrics at Sisters Hospital, dies.
2011
Family
Pauline (Daily) Weppner dies in Hilton Head, South Carolina.
2014
Family
Anne Theresa Fitzsimmons dies in Maryland.
2021
Family
Benjamin H. Weppner dies, the last of Elmer and Mary Louise's children.
2026
Family
Sean Weppner compiles this family history and dedicates it to his father, Dr. Dennis Michael Weppner.