A. C. Haeselbarth : writings and about
A. C. Haeselbarth (1861-1918) came into view for his series of profiles of American Women of the Press, in the trade journal The Editor and Publisher (1913-15). Those profiles are listed at 2568.
This page provides information about, and lists some writings by, this writer, novelist, newspaper publisher, colonial administrator, and newspaper librarian, in these two sections —
about
by
black bar ╹ at left margin returns page to top.
an obituary is pictured at the Find a Grave page for Haeselbarth ( link ), and is transcribed below :
A. C. Haeselbarth of World, Dies
Was former member of staff of The Editor and Publisher — founder of newspapers and U. S. Director of Charities at Porto Rico
Adam Christian Haeselbarth, for ten years librarian and correspondent of the New York World, died of acute dilation of the heart, at his home in Leonia, N. J., last Saturday morning. He was a former member of the staff of The Editor and Publisher.
Mr. Haeselbarth was a man of scholarly mind and kindly heart. He was born in Nyack, N. Y., May 18, 1861, the son of the Rev. William G. Haeselbarth, founder of the Nyack Weekly Journal.
He founded the Nyack Evening Journal and Nyack Star and for eight years was with the Syracuse Herald, a part of the time as Albany correspondent. After the Spanish-American War he was sent to Porto Rico by the United States Government as Director of Charities and remained there six years, during which he wrote the novel of Porto Rican life, “Patty of the Palms.” He also acted as correspondent of the World. On his return he became a member of the staff of the World Almanac, later becoming librarian.
He married, October 15, 1884, Mis Evelyn Oakley, daughter of David L. Oakley, of Yonkers, and is survived by her, one daughter, Mrs. Samuel M. Hyde, of Leonia; two sisters, Misses Mary and Virginia Haeselbarth, of Leonia, and a brother, John R. Haeselbarth, of Nyack. While in Syracuse he wrote much widely copied humorous verse under the pen name of “Jim Dash.”
The funeral was held Tuesday night. Internment was at Pleasant View Cemetery, Dutchess County, N. Y., Wednesday morning.
the source is The Editor and Publisher 50:33 (January 26, 1918) : 34
link (google books)
His death was noted also in The Library Journal 43:4 (April 1918) : 282 : link
full transcription below.
Among the men who do missionary work in our cities, there are many who led strange lives. Men who have been gamblers, card sharpers, prize fighters, thugs, corner loafers, and even professional criminals, as well as the reclaimed wrecks of many honorable trades and professions may be found doing the work of the missions. In the whole list, however, there will hardly be one whose life story is stranger than that of Ben J. Scoville, who is now preparing at the Christian Alliance School in Nyack, N. Y., for special missionary work among stage folk. Scoville has been in his thirty years of life street gamin, cabin boy, ship's cook, tramp, chore boy, actor, reciter, teacher of elocution, and at one time assistant stage manager for Sir Henry Irving. In his experience of the seas he was a chief witness for the conviction of Hughes, one of the most brutal murderers in the history of crime. excerpts — Of course, no one who visits Porto Rico can remain long in San Juan without hearing the tradition of the haunted sentry box of San Cristobal fortress, and going to see the ancient little structure, which overhangs the restless ocean and which is shunned by all Porto Ricans as being one of the particular pieces of property to which the devil holds undisputed title. The story as handed down for nearly two centuries and as implicitly believed by thousands is that one night a Spanish soldier, who was known to all his associates as a man who frequently denied the existence of either a God or an evil one, was put on duty as a sentry on the wall at the end of which is the now blackened and moss-covered box. When the following morning dawned and an investigation was made upon his failure to report no trace of him could be found. He had disappeared — body, boots and gun. In a few hours the news spread through the city that the devil had taken him. For weeks afterward the commandant of San Cristobal ordered miles of beach patrolled, hoping that the corpse night be found and the terror of the people and of the missing man’s companions in arms might be allayed. But the search proved futile, not the slightest clue discovered. As the years have passed the weird tale has been transmitted far beyond the third and fourth generation and the sentry box of San Cristobal is given a wide berth by old and young Spaniards and Porto Ricans in San Juan. “May the devil take you this very night!” “‘I wanted to die — yet I wanted, too, to live and take vengeance on her and on him. Her last, hot words burned in my mind: “May the devil take you this very night!” He would be alone in his box by the sea that night. I could — then I shuddered at the wicked thought. I followed him and drove a stiletto deep into his back to a vital part. It was high noon the next day when I ventured forth after my hours of sleepless agony. It seemed as if every one could read my guilt. One of the first persons I met was the Donna Isabel Alvarez. She looked as haggard as I did. on uncinariasis, or hookworm — aside — frontispiece illustration by Dan Smith (1865-1934).
introduction : brief notice thus — A more recent, and quite interesting reference to Haeselbarth’s novel is found in : That essay is concerned with narratives of the past, created by colonial (and their successor colonial) administrations/authorities. I quote only Rivera’s opening to that discussion —
“A rival and supplementary archive emerged in the United Stated States at the dawn of the Spanish-American War as a publishing frenzy consisting of memoirs, official reports conflating topographical surveys, agricultural prospects, reports of customs, theories of race, population, and hygiene, and the contested histories of Cuba, the Philippines, Guam, Hawaii, and Puerto Rico. — As I look through the novel — and its observations about U.S. “ignorance of the real affairs” on the island (p 13), not to mention Haeselbarth’s other writing on Puerto Rico — I recall Yarimar Bonilla’s guest essay in the New York Times : “Kamala Harris’s Epic Fail in Puerto Rico” (March 28, 2024) : link (paywall) She writes : The profiles are of : Samuel Cahan (1886-1974) July 11, 1914 : link 20240405
The sunny South (Atlanta, Ga.) 1875-1907 (March 16, 1901), Image 4 : link
Scoville was born in London, England, thirty years ago. His father, an officer in the British army, was killed in the Zulu war, leaving a widow and two children, Ben and a baby sister. The mother, through elocutionary and musical talent, supported the children in comparative comfort until she suddenly died. On the day of her burial, while a salute of honor was being fired over her grave, the children were deserted by their guardian, who left them penniless and friendless in London. They drifted into the White Chapel district and managed during warm weather to eke out a precarious living, Ben earning a few pennies a day as a newsboy, street sweeper and bootblack. At night they slept in alleys, under wagons, or wherever shelter offered.
Then came the winter days and on the night of first snow storm of the season the homeless waifs crawled into a hogshead, which stood in the shadow of the Nelson monument, in Trafalgar Square. Ben wrapped his sister with his thin coat to keep her warm. The snow drifted in upon them and the next morning, when Ben, benumbed, awoke, his little companion was dead. The next day she was buried in the public burial field, four newsboys acting as bearers, and Ben made the first great resolution of his life, that he would earn enough some day to have the body exhumed and laid to rest beside their mother.
The sea had an attraction for him. He visited the wharves until he secured a place as cabin boy with Captain Hoyle, on the ship Vanguard. On this vessel he remained several years and was promoted to be cook’s assistant. The captain’s daughter, Mary, helped him with his studies, and he grew very fond of her. One day, while she was playing ball on the deck, a sudden lurch of the ship threw her overboard. Ben plunged after her and with considerable difficulty kept her afloat until both were hauled on board. For this bravery, on his return to London, he was presented with five pounds by the Royal Humane Society. He had saved two pounds out of his wages and at once proceeded to gratify his long cherished desire. He had his sister’s body removed from the public burial field and buried by her mother. He then returned to the sea, this time as steward's assistant on the steamer Priscilla, Captain William Hughes, from Rio de Janeiro to London.
On the Priscilla was a feeble-minded boy whom Hughes had taken to sea in return for £100 paid by the lad's guardians. This boy, from the time he left London, was subjected to gross indignities and cruelties inflicted by the captain on his mate. On Christmas day the outrages approached the climax. The boy was brought to the mess and given only the bones which the ship’s dog had gnawed. When the little fellow reached out his hand for some plum duff the mate struck him a blow with a carving knife, cutting a deep gash in his hand. The blood spurted on Ben, who tore up his only white shirt to stanch the flow and make bandages. On New Year’s eve, as Ben and a companion were on deck, the saw Captain Hughes and the mate bring the boy out. There was an altercation and loud oaths and the boy was struck. As he shrieked with pain Captain Hughes carried him to the rail and hurled him into the sea. There was one piercing scream and then all was still.
Ben and his fellow witness of the crime said nothing, but when the reached London, Ben promptly informed the murdered lad’s guardians. Hughes and the mate were arrested, tried, convicted upon Ben’s testimony, and were sentenced to be hanged. On the night before his execution in Newgate prison Hughes confessed the he had acted as principal or accessory in the murder of more than thirty boys in the same way. Most of them were feeble minded and generally the guardians paid £100 for having them taken to see.
Once more Ben returned to the ocean. He endured many hardships and on his last voyage as a sailor was shipwrecked. He drifted ten days in an ocean boat, subsisting on a biscuit and a gill of water a day. After his rescue he underwent a long illness in the Marine hospital, London.
On being discharged from the hospital he worked his way on a cattle steamer to this country and struck out for Buffalo, thinking from the name of that city that the biggest cattle ranges must be there. He learned differently, but subsisted awhile by doing odd jobs and by dancing hornpipes in saloons. He then went to Cleveland, O., where he engaged with a doctor to chores for $1 a week and his board, with the great privilege of attending school. Ben cared for two horses, waited on the doctor’s wife and daughters, and did a lot of other menial work; but he stuck it out until he graduated from the Cleveland High school. Then he went to Birmingham, Ala., and paid his way for a year in Howard college by ringing the college bell, acting as agent for a laundry and doing chores. From Alabama [he] went to Colorado and secured work in Stratton’s great Independence mine, in Cripple Creek, earning enough to progress in his studies in Colorado college, Colorado Springs. Then came a miner’s strike and he lost his job.
Scoville next went to Chicago, where he failed to find employment and sold his watch to pay his railroad fare to Cleveland. From Cleveland he walked to Batavia, N. Y., where he earned enough by washing the windows of the Young Men’s Christian Association building to carry him to Lyons. At Lyons the Rev. Mr. Ostrander became interested in him and secured him a church collection. Similar assistance was given him in Port Byron, and from there he went to Boston.
Full of hope, Ben then applied to Manager Frank W. Hale, of the New England Conservatory, and begged admission as a student in elocution and oratory. An arrangement was made whereby he could earn his tuition fees and expenses by working ten hours a day in the model machine shops and printing department. He applied himself closely and was graduated with honors in December, 1896.
From then began his professional career. For a time he supported himself in Syracuse as a reciter, then traveled about the country until he met the “Sign of the Cross” company, at Peoria, and joined it. Wilson Barrett took him to England with his English company, and Scoville had a wide stage experience on the other side, playing such diverse parts as Tubal, in “The Merchant of Venice;” Duncan, in “Macbeth;” Jacques, in “As You Like It;” Nero, in “The Sign of the Cross;” Sir Joseph Porter, in “Pinafore;” Queen of Fairies, in “Jack and the Beanstalk.” He was for a time assistant stage manager for “Robespiere,” with Henry Irving’s company. In Manchester, Scoville met and fell in love with a girl, whom he married at the termination of his engagement with Irving’s company. They came to this country and he got a position as professor of elocution in the high school at Galveston, Tex. On the day of the floor he was in the high school building and with others was penned there by the water. All the next day he searched for his wife and in the evening he found her body in the ruins.
Grief stunned and without ambition, Scoville came to New York and wandered aimlessly about the city. By chance he went into a missionary meeting, where a former opera singer was holding special meetings, and decided to join the missionary work. He is now taking the regular course and he intends to work not only among stage folk, but among those who have failed to establish themselves on the stage and are drifting or have drifted into dissolute ways of life. Of New York, the mecca of the stage struck, he recently wrote to a friend:
“New York is full of poor, ambitious young men and women, who think it great sport to go upon the stage. These become sadly ‘left,’ abd stroll about the city streets, going from bad to worse. It would not be so bad if this host were only from New York, but they are from all parts of Canada and the United States. If a man is tall he stands some little show, provided he has a degree of talent. A woman must be a ‘good-looker,’ have an attractive shape, and if she has money, or a ‘friend’ who has plenty of dust — happy woman. Otherwise she is ‘N. G.’ A woman is subjected to all the slander and abuse the managers and state [stage?] managers see fit to bestow upon her. This is drawing it mild. ‘Alf-and-’alf, don’t you know. You may draw it as you like.
“I believe that a great work can be done among actors and actresses, especially among those that have been disappointed in the life of the stage and want to make something of themselves and get into a respectable way of living before they graduate down on the Bowery and Water street. I hope that God will open up the way for me to start this neglected good work. And now, if you know any young men or women who are starting on the stage, tell them to stay out of New York city, for it is overrun; let them be sure and secure a return ticket and take good care of it.”
The New York Times (Magazine supplement, p4) (March 9, 1902) : link (paywall)
“The safeguard of American interests is the Executive Council, at present composed of earnest, hard-working, patriotic men who handle legislation from both the American and Porto Rican standpoint, thus evolving laws of a nature best calculated to slowly lift the Porto Ricans to an American level. Governor Hunt, the Executive Council and the entire administration are contending daily with conflicting Spanish laws, with ignorance, with customs established for centuries and with the underlying anti-American sentiment already referred to. It is out of this chaos that order must come... Political conditions on the island are deplorable... The Americans are naturally neutral, and the Insular Government holds itself diplomatically aloof from the native mix-up... It will be long before there is any noticeable degree of social affiliation between the Americans and the Porto Ricans in a broad sense. Both sides are necessarily clannish. The mixture in Porto Rican blood does not appeal favorably to Americans, and intermarriages are of rare occurrence. The Americans look askance at certain decidedly unpleasant hereditary traits in the Porto Ricans and view with disgust the habits of the lower classes. Of course there are exceptions to every rule...”
For me, however, shortly after my arrival in San Juan the abhorred box assumed a strange fascination. I believe that there is a dash of superstition in the mental make-up of every one, and my excursions to San Cristobal soon had the effect, I am not ashamed to say, of exciting in me actual curiosity as to how such a story could have originated and how, if the Spanish warrior did drop out of existence, his taking away could have been accomplished.
Late one afternoon in November, 1901, as, for want of something better to do, I stood watching some workmen lazily removing part of the wall of an ancient house near Casa Blanca, Ponce de Leon’s home, I observed that they had uncovered a small secret deposit vault about two feet deep by three wide, in the massive masonry. The door which had hidden the compartment from view was evidently buried in the debris and the vault was quite empty.
As I speculated upon the probable use to which the open space had been put a Porto Rican boy, whom I had not before noticed, hurried up to me over the heaps of brick and mortar as fast as hie bare feet would permit. While with one hand he gesticulated toward the secret vault, with the other he offered for my inspection a small, molded leather bap. stiff and warped, and with a rusted clasp which fell at my touch.
With my penknife I quickly pried the leather apart sufficiently far to see that a paper, yellow with age, was within. I drew from my pocket a silver dollar. The boy’s eyes glistened as he eagerly took the coin, and the treasure, certainly worth possessing as an antique, was mine.
The attention of the workmen now being attracted to our presence, I deemed it wise to examine my purchase in private and went to my hotel, only stopping on the way to engage for that evening the services of a translator, an aged linguist whom I had met a few times and whom I felt I could trust.
In due time my translator appeared and had Just settled himself with the paper at a table, on which were a reading lamp and writing materials, and I had just given him instructions to carefully interpret and transcribe, when I was called out. Despite my anxiety to know the contents of the document, I was detained from home more than an hour. When I returned I found him much agitated. He at once commenced to question me as to how, when and where I obtained possession of the paper, saying that it was of very great concern and should be given to the authorities.
“It solves,” he declared, a mystery of centuries. “It is like a dream. You have heard the story of the haunted sentry box of San Cristobal?”
I nodded assent, as a queer feeling of expectancy came over me.
“Through you. then,” he continued, “the truth is now known. This paper you have found is a voice from the grave — the words of one long since turned to dust. It is a wonder — a marvel. Listen.”
Slowly and with occasional reference to notes, he read, as I eagerly listened with a sense of exultation:
“‘I, Donna Mercedes Fernandes, about to die and craving the forgiveness of the good Lord, the Blessed Virgin and all the saints for my enormous crime, do now tell it to the world that the strange disappearance of Ramon Parrondo from San Cristobal be forever explained and that I may find peace with him in paradise. I was born of a family proud in Spain and whose name I will not even now disgrace by writing it. I use instead the name by which I have long been known in San Juan. I was but a child when Ramon Parrondo won my heart and I followed him here to become, I supposed, his wife. He treated me well until Donna Isabel Alvarez, whom I thought my friend, took him from me. Even now I find it hard to forgive her — but I do, peace be to her soul! Perhaps I could have stood it had she not taunted me with his love for her and his coldness toward me — she that perhaps never would have met him but for me.
“‘One day when I least expected it I came upon them together in a secluded spot. They were quarreling, so loudly that I could not help but hear them. I heard him try to calm her. He told her that he loved her only and that he loved me no longer. Still she was angry and refused to listen. As she turned to leave him she said: “May the devil take you this very night!” Then they walked, away and I was left alone with a cold and heavy heart.
“‘As I passed through the city the vesper bells were ringing and it would have been well for me had I heeded their call. But I1 was in no mood for religious consolation then. All I seemed to hear, again and again, was a voice saying; “May the devil take you this very night!”
“‘When the darkness fell I was at the fortress and had crept unobserved to a secluded spot near enough to reach him when I wished.
“‘The cover of night favored my plans. For a time, with growing hatred, I watched him pace his beat. Then, with sudden desperation, as he walked away from the box, I followed him and — may God forgive me! — I drove a stiletto deep into his back and to a vital part. With one groan he fell on his face, casting his gun from him as he did so, and I struck again and again in blind fury. Then, oh, how well I remember it! I turned the still form over, threw myself upon it and rained tears and kisses on the face I yet loved despite his conduct. Then terror seized me and as fast as I could I dragged him to the wall, and, by lifting and pushing, cast him into the sea. The moon, which but a moment before was obscured by a murky cloud, shone at the same instant, and as the corpse struck the water I was sure I saw the gleam of the belly of a huge teburon (shark). His gun, too, I threw into the ocean — and then I fled.
“‘“And so,” she said sadly, byway of greeting, “he is lost to us both.”
“‘“I have heard,” I replied.
“‘“And heard you of his last message to me?” she asked.
“‘I responded that I had not, adding, with bitterness, that I supposed it was of love.
“Not so; see!” quickly answered the Donna Isabel, handing me a bit of paper. “We quarreled yesterday,” she continued, “and as I left him I wished the devil might take him and the devil has! But, alas, my peace is gone by this; for I know Ramon will keep his word, even in death.”
“‘The message which I read, scrawled in Ramon’s handwriting, was: “If the devil takes me this night I shall ask him to let you join me soon.”
“‘“It is of this and of my fate that the city is talking,” said the Donna Isabel, excitedly. “I know, Donna Mercedes, you do not love me, but even you cannot wish for me this awful fate.”
“‘“Nor do I, Donna Isabel,” I replied, softened for the moment by my sudden discovery that to the devil and not to me did the people ascribe the disappearance of Ramon Parrondo.
“‘“Come, calm yourself,” I continued. “What know we of the power of the dead? It may be that Ramon cannot fulfill his threat.”
“‘But Donna Isabel only sighed and shook her hand dubiously.
“‘The days passed and Ramon’s death was soon forgotten, except by the soldiers, who were forced to take what had been his lonely beat, and by the Donna Isabel and myself. I knew that my bloody secret, mow here revealed for the first time, was safe. But the Donna Isabel would not be comforted and spent her days and nights in fear and prayer. The end of such a condition might have been expected. One morning about six months after my crime she was found dead with an empty poison bottle by her side. And all that she wrote in a note to me was: “I go to join Ramon, be he with the devil or with the saints.”
“‘Forty years have gone since then and now I soon must face the judgment. Now I pray only for foregiveness.
(Signed)
“‘MERCEDES FERNANDEZ.
“‘January, 173—.’”
It is difficult to describe my feelings as the translator finished the reading of the Donna Mercedes’ confession. He gazed at me in silence a moment and I returned his stare. Then he said:
“And what does the senor think of it?”
"Think!” I shouted, roused from my lethargy to a realization of the importance of my find, “I think that pays me for living a year in Porto Rico!”
Bulletin of the American Geographical Society 35:2 (1903) : 125-130
issue : link
article : link
U California copy/scan (via hathitrust) : link
“Nearly one-fourth of the deaths on the island are from anemia, and the same disease causes fatal ravages in the Philippines and the Southern States, hence all Americans are deeply concerned.”
from wikipedia, on hookworm infection, this —
“Integrated Approaches
Evaluation of numerous public health interventions has generally shown that improvement in each individual component ordinarily attributed to poverty (for example, sanitation, health education and underlying nutrition status) often have minimal impact on transmission.” (link)
In the following pages the author has attempted to portray, without bias, some of the conditions in Porto Rico since American occupation and to show what degree of success has resulted from attempts at “benevolent assimilation.” Keeping this purpose in view the reader will have no difficulty in discriminating between facts and fiction, the fiction being confined to the love story. Even the pleasantries in the book are based upon a very broad foundation of truth and were interpolated to complete the picture and with nothing but the most cordial feeling towards every Porto Rican except those who are anti-American in spirit and who retard the coming of brighter days in the beautiful Island. Until the day comes (and may God speed it!) when there are no anti-American Porto Ricans and anti-Porto Rican Americans in high places in Borinquen, this book will continue to be an accurate reflection of the lights and shadows of life in Uncle Sam’s new insular possession.
San Juan, Porto Rico, 1907.
A. C. H.
“A treatise on education in Porto Rico, with love making beneath the palms. Rather hard reading.”
The Smart Set 26:3 (November 1908) : 159 : link
David Maldonado Rivera, “Method, Ethics, and Historiography : A Late Ancient Caribbean in the Temporalities of Empire” at Ancient Jew Review (January 25, 2022) : link
“A curious contribution to this repository is Adam Haeselbarth’s 1907 novel, Patty of the Palms, which narrates the Caribbean rendezvous of a young American couple, Howell and Patty, exploring their prospects in the new island territory. As the couple strolls through the weary, centenary streets of Old San Juan in Puerto Rico, they reach the old cathedral of St John the Baptist and venerate the relics of its Roman martyr St Pius. Howell and Patty are mesmerized by the visage of Puerto Rico’s past...
“As subtext to this romantic stroll, was the question of the ownership of perceived patrimony...”
“While working-class Puerto Ricans suffer the blows of austerity and second-class citizenship, tax incentives have attracted a wave of investors and remote workers, further straining the island’s resources and displacing its residents.”
see directory (and some notes/expansions) at 2568
Ruth Cameron (Persis Dwight Hannah)
Hetty Cattell (aka Hester Cattell, Hetty Cattell Parker, and Hettie Fithian Cattell)
Dorothy Dix
Flora Kendall Edmond
Grace Van Braam Gray
Nixola Greeley-Smith
Marion Brunot Haymaker
Rose Henderson
Rosalie Armisted Higgins
Susah Franks Iden
Lily W. Lykes
Sue McNamara
Marguerite Mooers Marshall
Ada Patterson
Martha H. Porter
Henrietta Rodman
Edna K. Wooley
Nelson Hersh, of The World, watched a barefooted newsboy draw a sketch on the side-walk 19 years ago — Sequel : ‘Sammy Cahan’ is now a famous sketch artist.”
The Editor & Publisher 50:33 (January 6, 1918) : 11
link (google books)
profile and examples of his work at Pulp Artists : link
Miss Schorer tells how the Evening World’s ‘Kiddie Club’ makes life brighter for a vast army of children through encouraging self-expression.”
The Editor & Publisher 50:41 (March 23, 1918) : 20 : link (google books)
July 25, 1914 : link
August 1, 1914 : link and link
August 8, 1914 : link
August 15, 1914 : link
September 5, 1914 : link