Frank G Ader

FRANK G ADER is an extensive contractor, and the breadth and importance of his business have made him a leading representative of trade interests and one of the substantial promoters of the material development and general prosperity of the country. Mr. Ader is in the concrete construction business at Newport, Kentucky, in which city he was born October 18, 1874, the son of Peter and Mary (Collett) Ader.

The father, a native of Bavaria, Germany, when about two years old came to the United States with his parents in 1844, being the youngest of fourteen children. The family settled on a farm on Owl Creek, about seven miles from Newport, in Campbell county, Kentucky, where the parents of Peter lived the remainder of their lives. The farm is still owned by the heirs. Peter Ader was reared on the farm and when a young man went to Cincinnati and worked in a furniture factory for thirty years, maintaining his residence at Newport. In 1893, when the cement industry was in its infancy, he engaged in that business in Newport, being the pioneer in that line in northern Kentucky, importing cement in those days from Germany. He built up an extensive business, in which he continued until his death, which occurred in 1904, on the 6th of July, at the age of sixty years.

The business was carried on by Peter Ader & son after 1900, Frank G, our subject, becoming a member at that date. Mr. Peter Ader was always very active in all that pertained to the best interests of the city, serving on the fire and police boards and holding several minor offices. In politics he was a lifelong Democrat, and during the time of the war between the states he was a member of the Home Guards at Newport. He was married twice, first to a Miss Krontz, who was the mother of two sons, and after her death he married Mary Collutt (sic).

Mary Collutt, the mother of our subject was born in Pennsylvania, her parents both being foreign born, her father a native of Alsace Lorraine and her mother, from Prussia, Germany, of French descent. They came to the United States and settled in Pennsylvania, and later became pioneers of Cincinnati. The mother had three sons by Peter Ader, of whom our subject is the eldest, and she died in Newport in 1906, at the age of sixty-three years. She had been previously married to Charles Wuest, by whom she had been the mother of two sons.

Frank G Ader was reared in Newport and educated in the public schools, acquiring the branches usually taught in those departments. When fifteen years old he began mechanical engineering, and, learning the same, working in Cincinnati for a time, but he was young and restless and wanted to see more of the world than he had hitherto had an opportunity of doing. For two years he stayed in Arizona and southern California, being employed as an engineer in those countries.

Returning to Newport in 1900, he entered into business with his father in the concrete construction work, and after his father's death he bought out the interests of the heirs and since 1904 has carried on the same under the firm name of Frank G Ader Construction Company, which has developed into one of the largest in this line in Kentucky, giving employment to many men and handling many large contracts.

In addition to Mr. Ader's regular business he is interested in various other affairs. He is a director in the Daylight Building Association of Newport and also director of the Cincinnati Builder's Supply Company. In politics Mr. Ader has always been a stanch Democrat but has never taken an active part in political affairs, as his business life made all the demands upon his time that he could manage.

On November 7, 1906, Mr. Ader was married to Elizabeth Huber, a native of Newport, Kentucky, and the daughter of the late Phillip Huber, who for many years was a wholesale confectioner in Cincinnati. Mr. and Mrs. Ader have one child, named Mary Julia.