Frederick Trump

Frederick Trump (born Friedrich Trump, ; March 14, 1869 – May 30, 1918) was a German and American businessman. He was the patriarch of the Trump family and the paternal grandfather of Donald Trump, the 45th and 47th president of the United States.

Born and raised in Kallstadt, in what was then the Kingdom of Bavaria, Trump immigrated to the United States in 1885. In 1891, he began speculating in real estate in Seattle. During the Klondike Gold Rush, he moved to Yukon, Canada, and made his fortune by operating a restaurant and a brothel for miners in Whitehorse. was born in Kallstadt in the Palatinate (then part of the Kingdom of Bavaria) to Johannes Trump II (1829–1877) and Katharina Kober (1836–1922). Religiously, the village was Lutheran. The couple had a son, Johann Sebastian Trump (1699–1756). Johann Sebastian's son Johann Paul Trump (1727–1792) was born in Bobenheim am Berg.

The first link to Kallstadt can be established for Johann Sebastian's grandson Johannes Trump (1789–1836) who was born in Bobenheim am Berg and married in Kallstadt, where he also died. Graves from the 21st century at the village cemetery indicate that members of the Trump family still live in Kallstadt.

From 1816 to 1918, when Bavaria became the Free State of Bavaria, the Palatinate was part of the Kingdom of Bavaria. In 1871, Bavaria became a part of the newly formed German Empire. During periods of war and anti-German discrimination in the US, Trump's son Fred later denied his German heritage, claiming his father had been a Swede from Karlstad. This version was repeated by Fred's son Donald in his 1987 autobiography.

After being sick with emphysema for 10 years, Frederick's father, Johannes, died on July 6, 1877, aged 48, leaving the family in severe debt from medical expenses.

Immigration to the United States

U.S. Immigration records. Line 133 notes "Friedr. Trumpf." age 16, born in Kallstadt, Germany. In 1885, at age 16, Trump immigrated via Bremerhaven, Germany, to the United States aboard the steamship Eider, departing on October 7 U.S. immigration records list his name as "Friedr. Trumpf" and his occupation as "none". He moved in with his older sister Katharina – who had immigrated in 1883 Trump lived with his relatives on the Lower East Side of Manhattan in a neighborhood with many Palatine German immigrants, at 76 Forsyth Street. After evidence of mineral deposits had been discovered in 1889, Monte Cristo was expected to produce a fortune in gold and silver. Many prospectors moved to the area in hopes of becoming rich. Rumors about financial investments by millionaire John D. Rockefeller in the entire Everett area created an exaggerated expectation of the area's potential. a town known for prospectors building boats in order to travel to Dawson. In Bennett, Trump and Levin opened the Arctic Restaurant and Hotel, which offered fine dining, lodging and sex in a sea of tents. They moved the building by barge, relocated on Front Street, and were operational by June. Blair wrote that "once again, in a situation that created many losers, [Frederick Trump] managed to emerge a winner." Trump's mother disapproved of Christ because she considered her family to be of a lower social class. Trump and Christ married on August 26, 1902, and moved to New York City. Due to Elizabeth Sr.'s extreme homesickness, the family returned to Germany later that year. For several months, Trump petitioned Luitpold, Prince Regent of Bavaria and the government to allow him to stay, but he was unsuccessful.

Sources differ on the size of Trump's estate: Gwenda Blair states that his net holdings included a 2-story, 7-room home in Queens; 5 vacant lots; $4,000 in savings; $3,600 in stocks; and 14 mortgages, placing his net worth at $31,359 ($), Trump's wife and son Fred continued his real estate projects under the name Elizabeth Trump & Son.

Earlier recorded forms of the family name U.S. immigration records from October 1885 list his name as Friedr. Trumpf. An early recorded appearance of the name "Trump" appears 25 years later in the 1910 United States census records. A 2015 Deutsche Welle article claims Blair said in an interview that Trump's grandfather was named Friedrich Drumpf, which contradicts the statement in Blair's earlier book. According to Kallstadt's transportation association, "Drumpf" was the original spelling of the family's surname but that it had already been changed to "Trump" before this spelling was recorded in the population register produced by the French annexation of the Left Bank of the Rhine (from 1798 to 1814). The fact-checking website Snopes presents sources showing the family name was once "Drumpf" and showing the aforementioned contradictory reporting of Blair's opinion on whether Frederick Trump first used "Drumpf" but also showing that neither Donald Trump nor his father ever had the surname Drumpf.