Augustus Frank

Who was Augustus Frank?

Augustus Frank was a United States Representative from New York during the American Civil War.

Born in Warsaw, Wyoming County, he was a nephew of two other U.S. Representatives, William Patterson and George Washington Patterson. Frank attended the common schools, engaged in mercantile pursuits, was director and vice president of the Buffalo & New York City Railroad Company, and was a delegate to the Republican National Convention in 1856. He was elected and served three terms as a Republican Congressman from New York, from March 4, 1859, to March 3, 1865, in the 36th, 37th, and 38th Congresses. He was not a candidate for renomination in 1864.

After his final term in Congress, Augustus became the director of the Wyoming County National Bank in 1865. In 1867 and 1868 he was a member of the New York constitutional convention.

He married Agnes McNair in 1867, and the couple had two children. Their son died as an infant, and their daughter was Mary Frank. From 1870 to 1872, Augustus Frank was also one of the managers of the Buffalo State Asylum for the Insane in Buffalo, New York. He organized the Bank of Warsaw in 1871 and served as its president until his death in 1895. He was also director of the Rochester Trust and Safe Deposit Company. Frank was State commissioner for the preservation of public parks, was a member of the board of directors of the Buffalo, Rochester & Pittsburgh Railroad, and was a delegate at large to the State constitutional convention in 1894.