Frank was set up as an independent Lutheran parish in 1768 and the pastor was resident there.
Frank, a German Lutheran colony, was until October 1918 the Township center of the Frank Township, Atkarsk Region, Saratov Province, 110 versts from the city of Saratov and 94 versts south of the county town of Atkarsk. Frank was founded as a Crown colony on 16 May 1767 by 117 families from Mecklenburg, Palatinate, Saxony and Darmstadt-Isenburg. In an edict dated 26 February 1768, Frank was given the Russian name of Medeveditskii Krestovyi Buyerak because of where it was located on the river.
As of 1859, there were in Frank a Lutheran church (built in 1842), a parochial school, a market, 3 oil producing factories and one mill.
Colonists from Frank helped to found the daughter colonies of Brunnental in 1855 and Langenfeld in 1859. In 1859, 120 colonists moved to the Samara Province on the Wiesenseite.
A Regional government school was founded in 1871 with both governmental and private funds. Books and other supplies were provided by the government. Tuition has been set so that all can afford to attend: full payment 11-14 rubles; only 6 rubles for the poor.
|
Year
|
Households
|
Population
|
||
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Total
|
Male
|
Female
|
||
| 1767 |
117
|
335
|
|
|
| 1769 |
115
|
425
|
215
|
210
|
| 1773 |
115
|
525
|
282
|
243
|
| 1788 |
109
|
704
|
367
|
337
|
| 1798 |
138
|
861
|
443
|
418
|
| 1816 |
191
|
1,415
|
768
|
647
|
| 1834 |
305
|
2,552
|
1,344
|
1,208
|
| 1850 |
314
|
3,775
|
1,905
|
1,870
|
| 1857 |
412
|
4,620
|
2,343
|
2,277
|
| 1859 |
303
|
4,684
|
2,383
|
2,301
|
| 1885 |
|
4,682
|
|
|
| 1897 |
|
5,080*
|
2,595
|
2,485
|
| 1905 |
|
5,454
|
|
|
| 1912 |
614
|
4,592
|
2,281
|
2,311
|
| 1920 |
654**
|
4,872
|
|
|
| 1922 |
|
4,999
|
|
|
| 1923 |
|
5,129
|
|
|
| 1926*** |
861
|
5,374
|
2,612
|
2,762
|
| 1931 |
|
5,485****
|
|
|
*Of whom 5,072 are German.
**Of which 643 households were German.
***Of whom 5,288 (2,561 male & 2,727 female) were German living in 832 households.
****Of whom 5,467 were German.
Lutheran
Beratz, Gottieb. The German colonies on the Lower Volga, their origin and early development: a memorial for the 150th anniversary of the arrival of the first German settlers on the Volga, 29 June 1764 . Translated by Adam Giesinger (Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 1991): 349.
Diesendorf, V.F. Die Deutschen Russlands : Siedlungen und Siedlungsgebiete : Lexicon. Moscow, 2006.
The German Settlements in the USSR before 1941 [in Russian] (Moscow, 2002): 125.
Mink, A.N. Historical and Geographical Dictionary of the Saratov Province [in Russian] (Saratov, Russia, 1898).
Orlov, Gregorii. Report of Conditions of Settlements on the Volga to Catherine II , 14 February 1769.
Pallas, P.S. Reise durch verschiedene Provinzen des Russischen Reichs. Theil 3,2, Reise aus Sibirien zurueck an die Wolga im 1773sten Jahr (St. Petersburg: Kaiserl. Academie der Wissenschaften, 1776): 623.
Pleve, Igor R. The German Colonies on the Volga: The Second Half of the Eighteenth Century , translated by Richard Rye (Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 2001): 318.
Schnurr, Joseph, Die Kirchen und das Religiöse Leben der Russlanddeutschen - Evangelischer Teil (Stuttgart: Landsmannschaft der Deutschen aus Russland, 1972): 344.
"Settlements in the 1897 Census." Journal of the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia (Winter, 1990): 18.
Frank and Kolb, Russia (Kelly Horst)
History of the Village Frank (Clarence Kissler)
Frank (wolgadeutsche.net) - in Russian
Frank-Kolb Facebook Page (Maggie Hein)