A German, Jewish and English surname, Franks comes from the Latin term ‘franci’ and the Old English term ‘franca’ which meant charitable, liberal and free. The spelling variations for Franks include Frank, Franke, Frink, Frenk and Frankes. In England the Franks surname is across most of the country and parts of Wales. The major concentration in numbers of Franks households are the city of London, Yorkshire, Durham and Lancashire. In Scotland some of the counties with the greatest Franks population are Lanarkshire, Midlothian, Fife, Roxburghshire and Aberdeenshire. Within the United States the original Franks families settled in Maryland, Pennsylvania, New York, Maryland, Ohio, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin and Missouri. Famous: Daniel Lamont “Bubba” Franks (professional football player), Michael Franks (musician, singer and songwriter), Charles Franks (founder of ‘Distributed Proofreaders’ to assist the Project Gutenberg - making books digital), William Sadler Franks (award winning English astronomer), Tanya Christine Franks (English actress, producer and writer), Herman Franks (professional baseball player and later coach), Michael “Mike” Franks (champion sprinter), Paul John Franks (English cricket player), Randall Franks (musician - guitar and mandolin and singer) and Augustus Wollaston Franks (19th century English antiquary (artifacts) expert).