AMOS O. OSBORN
Amos O. Osborn was born December 12, 1811, and is sixth in descent from his English ancestor Richard, who came from England to Hingham, Mass., in 1635 and went from there to New Haven, Conn., in
1639 where he became a free planter and shared in the division of land in 1643.
His father, Amos Osborn, born November 30, 1764, was a native of Trumbull, Fairfield county, Conn. He came to Waterville in 1802, where he engaged in distilling, and in 1810 purchased the farm, part of lot 39, where he and his son have ever since lived, of Benjamin White, who in turn had bought it of Col. Marimus Willet, one of the original proprietors. He was a man of industry and integrity, which with frugal living and wise management of affairs brought him a handsome competence later in life. He married Rosanna, a daughter of Benjamin Swetland, a soldier of the Revolution. Of the six children born to them, Amos O., the fourth, is the only one now living. He received his early education in Waterville and at the private school of Rev. Ely Burchard at Paris Hill. Later he went to Hamilton, which had already become a noted school centre, and after fitting there, was for two years a member of the class of 1836 of Yale College. After leaving college he studied law with his brother-in-law, the Hon. Levi D. Carpenter, of Waterville, and with Judge Joshua Spencer of Utica. In the fall of 1837 he was admitted to the bar, and soon after opened an office for the practice of his profession in Westfield, Chautauqua county, N. Y. After two years he returned to Waterville to engage in the same profession.
Mr. Osborn was a Whig in politics and has always been an ardent supporter of the Republican party. In the years 1845 and 1846 he was elected supervisor and for thirteen years was a justice of the peace while his party in Sangerfield was greatly in the minority. He also represented his district and was a useful member of the two-session Assembly in 1853. For forty-five years he was a director in the Bank of Waterville. In 1840 he was one of the original incorporators of Grace church, Waterville, and for fifty-three years has been its senior warden and a most liberal supporter. In 1853 he with his father-in-law, Deacon Joseph Moss of New Berlin, Chenango county, N. Y., built at their own expense its rectory.
It was by his suggestion and effort that the Waterville Cemetery Association was formed and it has been greatly by his aid that it has since become one of the finest village burial grounds in the State. Mr. Osborn has been its president and chairman of its executive committee ever since its incorporation.
The diary kept during the ninety days at sea of a journey to Australia in 1855 and 1856, at which time he circumnavigated the globe, and the notes of places visited both in Australia, on the Continent and in this country, show his quick habit of observation and the readiness with which he grasped and made use of points of special interest. Throughout all his life Mr. Osborn has been a student in literature and the sciences and a man of extensive research and learning. His large and well selected library, chiefly of books of reference and works on science, shows his ardent love of nature which has ever found in tree or flower, bird, insect or rock, something to study and admire, so that his life, seemingly one of leisure, has been a very busy and a very happy one. He has been much interested in geology and his studies and discoveries in that line have been of special interest and value to science. His collection of fossils is extensive and especially full from the series of rocks in his own neighborhood. He has also devoted much time and attention to the historical study of his own town. He prepared the chapter on the town of Sangerfield in Judge Jones's Annals of Oneida county, and has in preparation a fuller history, not yet published, in which are genealogical notices of over three hundred of the early settlers of the town which he has studied and arranged with great care. While thus untiring in self-development he has been greatly interested in the advancement of Sangerfield especially earnest in his views of right and law that should govern corporations and municipalities as well as individuals. His genial smile and cordial manner, his generous aid in case of need, his quick response of sympathy in joy or sorrow, his unvarying interest in the welfare of the public as well as its individual members, his public spirit always manifest in everything promising progress or improvement, have won for him the respect and esteem of the public in the community which gave him birth and which has strengthened and grown with his advancing years.
He is a life member of the American Museum of Natural History of the State of New York; a life member of the New York Agricultural Society; a member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science; a life member and fellow of the Geological Society of America and a life member and councilor of the Oneida Historical Society.
Mr. Osborn married for his first wife on May 23, 1838, Harriet N., youngest daughter of the late Joseph Moss and Rhoda Griffith of New Berlin, Chenango county, N.Y. She died March 27, 1861. Four daughters were born to them. Rosanna, who died in early childhood; Rosalie, wife of the artist Albert Bierstadt; Mary, wife of Charles C. Hall of New York, and Esther, the only one now living, the wife of William G. Mayer of the U.S. Navy, and later a leading lawyer in Cincinnati, Ohio. On July 1, 1863, Mr. Osborn married for his second wife, Adaline, youngest daughter of the late Ellis Morse and Adaline Bagg of Eaton, Madison county, N.Y.
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