Biography of Karl Gerner, pages 776/777/778.  History of DeKalb County, 
Indiana; B. F. Bowen & Company, Inc., Indianapolis, 1914.



Karl Gerner



	It is a general acknowledged fact that journalism is one of the 
most important factors in twentieth-century life, exerting as it does 
an influence on practically every department of society. This relation 
is just as actual and potent in the smaller cities and towns as in the 
larger cities and he who directs the policy, exerts a personal control 
over local thought and action not equaled by any other profession. 
Among the newspaper men of DeKalb county, who have, by their 
progressive attitude toward local affairs, contribute in a very 
definite measure to the advancement of the community, Is the gentleman 
whose names appears above and who is successfully publishing the 
Courier, at Auburn, Indiana.

	Karl Gerner, the son of Christian and Katherine (Keller) Gerner, 
was born in Adelheim, Baden, Germany, January 17, 1854.  His parents 
came to this country, in 1857, and settled at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.  
His father was a locksmith by trade, but later entered the mercantile 
business and continued in that for the remainder of his active life.  
Both of his parents are deceased.  His father served in the revolution 
of 1848, in Germany under General Segil, and was forced to leave the 
country on this account.  To Mr. and Mrs. Gerner, Sr., was born five 
children, three of whom are still living.

	Karl Gerner was educated in the public schools of Pittsburgh, 
Pennsylvania, and continued his education at Meadville in the same 
state.  He later went to Boston and completed the law course in that 
city. Feeling that the West offered the best field for the practice of 
his profession, he went to Iowa and located at Storm Lake, where he 
continued to practice for four years.  He then went to Colorado and 
practiced law and was appointed the United States commissioner, after 
which he went to South Dakota and entered a government claim at 
Iroquois, in that state.  He continues his practice in South Dakota for 
fourteen years, and was very successful in all of his cases.  An 
indication of his success is found in the fact that he was elected a 
member of the first South Dakota Legislature, upon the admission of 
that state to the Union.

After leaving the Legislature Mr. Gerner gave up his law practice and 
entered the newspaper business.  He was one of the founders of the 
Iroquois Chief, in South Dakota, and continued that paper until 1896, 
when he came to Indiana.  He located at Waterloo, DeKalb county, and 
started the Silver Dawn, a paper which advocated the free and unlimited 
coinage of silver, as set forth by the Democratic party at the time.  
He continued this publication until 1909, when he sold it.  He 
subsequently became associated with the Auburn Dispatch, and when the 
Dispatch was sold to the Auburn Printing Company he took charge of the 
Auburn Courier, which he still manages.

	In 1883 Karl Gerner was married to Harriett Mather, the daughter 
of Elias and Eliza (Herrick) Mather.  Mrs. Gerner’s father was born in 
Williamstown, Massachusetts, and was a lineal descended of Cotton 
Mather, famous preacher of Salem, Massachusetts, of the early colonial 
days.  Her mother, Eliza, was born in Aurora, Ohio, and her parents 
were pioneers at Twinsburg, that state.  Her grandfather, James 
Herrick, was a native of Connecticut.  When Harriett’s mother was a 
child of ten, her parents moved to New Jersey and later to Illinois, 
where her father died, She, her sister and the mother went to South 
Dakota, and lived there until her marriage to Mr. Gerner.  In her 
younger days Mrs. Gerner attended the University of Michigan at Ann 
Arbor.  She began teaching school at the age of sixteen, in Illinois, 
and later taught in South Dakota until her marriage.  After they came 
back to Indiana she taught in the public schools of Waterloo, for three 
years.  She became a member of the Progressive Literary Club at 
Waterloo, and was also a valued member of the Fortnightly Club of that 
place. In the literary clubs she began to urge the desirability of a 
public library at Waterloo, and continued to urge the ideas with great 
persistence. Others took up the proposition and with the joint effort 
of all the clubs of the town and the Woman’s Christian Temperance 
Union, a library was finally established, and later Carnegie Library 
was erected as a result of that beginning.  Mr. and Mrs. Gerner have 
two children, Karl and Harold.  Karl is clerking in the offices of the 
Baltimore & Ohio railroad at Garrett, and  Harold is still at home.

	Mr. Gerner has always taken an active part in different fraternal 
organizations.  While in Dakota he was grand master of the Ancient 
Order of United Workmen.  After coming to Indiana he became worshipful 
master of the Free and Accepted Masons at Waterloo, and he also served 
one term as worthy patron of the Order of the Eastern Star.  Mr. Gerner 
has always seen a stanch supporter of the Democratic party and his 
papers have always upheld the principles of that party.  In his long 
service as a newspaper man he has had the opportunity to advance the 
interests of his party in a very material way.

	Mr. and Mrs. Gerner have always taken a large part in every 
activity, which had for its object the bettering of the community in 
which they live.  They have been on the right side of all the 
educational or moral questions, and their influence has been an uplift 
to the neighborhood in which they have lived.  It is generally 
acknowledged that the influence of Mrs. Gerner had more to do with the 
recently dedicated library at Waterloo than any other person.



Submitted by:

Arlene Goodwin

Auburn, Indiana

Agoodwin@ctlnet.com