The Dissinger family is one of the old established ones of Lebanon county, and was founded in Pennsylvania by John Dissinger, who emigrated from Germany and settled near Schaefferstown just after the close of the Revolutionary War. As he was young at that time it is possible that he was accompanied by his parents, of whom we have no record. John Dissinger married Catherine Naeft, whose parents were also natives of Germany. A son of this marriage was the grandfather of Frank R. Dissinger.

John Dissinger was born in 1798, on a farm near Schaefferstown and followed farming nearly all his life in this locality. After the death of his wife, he removed to the home of his eldest child, Mary, Mrs. Barnhardt Forrest, in Campbelltown, where he died in 1881. The wife of John Dissinger was Catherine Connor, born about 1802. whose parents were natives of Ireland, her death occurring about 1857. Their children were: Mary (Polly), wife of Barnhardt Forrest, who for, fifty years carried on a tailoring business at Campbelltown; Rev. Henry, deceased, who married (first) Elizabeth Grumbein, and (second) Catherine Gensinger; John, deceased, who married Mary Books; Lydia, deceased, who married Rev. Samuel Books; Rev. Moses, who married (first) Susan Clark and (second) Amelia Seager; Edward, the father of Frank R.; Frank, who married (first) Susan Yokem and (second) Mary Fink; Cyrus, who married Emma Morvits; Kate, deceased, who married Henry Strohm; Samuel, who died young; and David, deceased, who married Fanny Clement.

Biographical Annals of Lebanon County - excerpt from biographical entry for Frank R. Dissinger. p.298