Orsemus Sackett

Orsemus Sackett, son of Ezekiel W Sacket and Ruth Hart, was born in Chili, Monroe County, New York State^G, on 19 July 1826.¹ He died aged 70 in Grand Rapids, Kent County, Michigan^G, on 18 August 1896^2,3 and was buried at Oak Hill Cemetery, Grand Rapids^G.² He married first in about 1846, Caroline E ___.⁴ Caroline was born in about October 1826.⁵ She died aged 25 on 29 July 1852 and was buried at Evergreen Cemetery, Owego, Tioga County, New York State^G.⁶ He married second in Allamakee County, Iowa^G, on 10 August 1858, Geraldine H Mathews.⁷ She was born in Iowa^G in about 1840.⁸ He married third in Kansas City, Jackson County, Missouri^G, on 23 December 1873, Nettie Jones.⁹ They divorced in 1891.¹⁰
     In 1860 Orsemus was living in Maryland, Otsego County, New York State^G, and was recorded in the census as Orsemus Sackett, a laborer, aged 34 and born in New York. Living with him were his second wife Geraldine, aged 19, their son Henry, aged ten months, and Orsemus's children, Althea, 12, and Edwin, 10, by his first wife Caroline.⁸
     Orsemus registered for the Civil War draft on 31 July 1863. He was a card writer, aged 37, living in Indianapolis, Indiana^G.¹¹
Orsemus, the Yankee card writer
     In the 1850s and early 1860s, Orsemus made a prosperous living as a card-writer, travelling the eastern cities and producing at high speed elegant hand-written visiting cards for discerning customers.
     Doubtless fuelled by a talent for self-promotion, Orsemus attracted much favorable press coverage for his penmanship, announcing his arrival in towns visited.
     However, he was not universally popular, the Syracuse Daily Courier in 1857 reporting that "Sackett, the impudent puppy who styles himself the "Yankee Card Writer," and is most unfavorably known in this locality, was horse-whipped in New Orleans last week for insulting a lady, and made to leave town for the same offence. He deserved all he got." This account would seem to have been somewhat exaggerated, a subsequent report in the Lowell Daily Citizen revealing that Orsemus's offence had been to "send a couple of ladies a bouquet with a card attached, stating that he wished to make their acquaintance." An uncle of the young ladies "took umbrage at the supposed insult, and castigated the gentleman accordingly." A response in the Boston Post, presumably given by Orsemus, stated that, "The report that the "Yankee Card Writer" had been horse whipped at New Orleans is untrue. The Y.C.W. is not a man to submit to any personal indignity."
Orsemus, entertainments manager
     From the later 1860s, he managed a bureau organising lecture tours from a base in Kansas City. Although it is unclear how much contact Orsemus had with his sons during their early years, it may have been as a result of this business that his son Jacob started his own career as an impresario, and his son Henry, the silhouettist, would appear to have inherited his father's artistic streak.
Orsemus, inventor
     Orsemus took out a patent with the United States Patent Office on 29 July 1879 for a new and improved hotel casket.¹² This invention was what might now be called a desk tidy, "to provide for the use of hotels, offices, and other places of business a simple, neat, and compact device for holding conveniently various kinds of inks, pens, pins, cards, envelopes, paper, sand-paper, call-bells, tooth-picks, card-trays, matches, pencils, and similar articles, and also to hold conspicuously various advertisements, cards, notices, directories, and other articles of that character."
     In 1880 Orsemus was living in Grand Rapids, Kent County, Michigan^G, and was recorded in the census as O Sackett, a manufacturer of caskets, married, aged 54. He appears to have been living alone.¹³ He was listed in the Grand Rapids City Directory for 1880 as a cabinet maker, of 205 N Ionia, living at 112 Stocking. An amendment in the directory for removals and alterations listed him as an inventor, living at 26 Center. In the 1881 directory he listed his occupation as "office furniture", and was living at 404 Jefferson Avenue. In 1883 he was listed without an occupation, living at 306 Lyon. In 1889 he was listed as a news dealer and had rooms at 34 W Bridge.^14,15,16,17
Orsemus, newspaper vendor
     The Chicago Herald reported on 11 November 1892 that "Orsemus Sackett, once a great personal friend of James Fenimore Cooper and a lecturer of some note, is now half blind and destitute and peddles papers for a living on Grand Rapids streets."¹⁸
     Orsemus was listed in the Grand Rapids City Directory of 1893 as a newsman, living at 50 Canal.¹⁹
Orsemus, and son Henry
     Orsemus resented his son Henry who he believed had ignored him when he had lost his health and his money. He took his revenge when the tables were turned and Henry asked his father for help. He not only refused Henry's appeal for funds but went public with a bitter condemnation of his son's behaviour. The story was printed in the Chicago Tribune on 7 February 1894.²⁰ It is not known whether father and son were reconciled before Orsemus died two years later, but Henry (recorded as X Ackley Sackett) did attend his father's funeral.^2,21
Orsemus, in his own words
     Orsemus gave an interview to the Chicago newspaper The Daily Inter Ocean, published on 20 June 1895.²²
Orsemus's will
     Orsemus made a will at Grand Rapids^G on 20 May 1896 in which he left his sons, Jacob, Henry, and Fitch, just one dollar each.²³ The residue of his estate, which according to newspaper reports was considerable, was to be divided among his nieces, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Orsemus specified that his assets be sold and the entire proceeds deposited in the Peoples Savings Bank for nineteen years (presumably so that the youngest beneficiary would by then be 21), when the accumulated sum was to be distributed equally to the named beneficiaries. They were named as: nieces Anna Mary Sackett and Eva Sackett, grandchildren Geraldine Irving and Byron Coles Irving, and great-grandchildren Althea Gertrude Wade, Julia Adeall Wade, and William Sherman Wade.
     Jacob contested the will but, at a hearing of the Kent County, Michigan, probate court held on 25 and 26 September 1896, it was ruled that the will should stand, and probate was granted to Charles Kelsey, the executor appointed by Orsemus.
     On 12 October 1903, the executor also proved the will at the Ramsey County, Minnesota, probate court after finding that Orsemus had owned real estate there.
Orsemus, an eccentric
     Orsemus Sackett was clearly an eccentric, but not an unpleasant or unpopular one. Certainly he was popular with the newsboys, some of whom passed a "resolution" stating that they "liked Mr Sackett very much", and that "he was always good to us and gave us jolly times by his sleighrides." The preacher at his funeral described him as "an eccentric who had, in his manner of living, separated himself from the rest of the world and lived a life apart from his fellows, but his qualities were not repellant, and he had attracted much sympathy."
     Orsemus's relationship with his three sons (his daughter Althea had died at age 20) was clearly distant, but that there had been a relationship at all was evidenced by his son Henry's remark that he believed himself to have always been his father's favorite.²¹