Otto Wilhelm Christian Schack

Otto Wilhelm Christian Schack (1818 – September 1, 1875) was a Danish born American broker.

Early life

Schack was born in Copenhagen, Denmark in 1818.^[a] He was the youngest son of Gregers Schack (1781–1840) and Anna Sophie Kircksteen (1788–1854). His father was a Counselor of State and Secretary of Finance to the King of Denmark.^[1] Among his siblings were the soldier and painter Sophus Schack,^[2] and sister Caroline Schack, who married industrialist Lauritz Peter Holmblad.^[3]

Otto "received a careful education up to his seventeenth year, when he came to the United States under the charge of Mr. Rudolph Braüm, one of his father's many warm friends. He remained with Braüm until that gentleman's death."^[1]

Career

In 1848, he began a career on Wall Street, becoming a broker-dealer and a member of the New York Stock Exchange in 1851. He was associated with Messrs. Jacob Little & Co. for 27 years, the head of which, Jacob Little, was his brother-in-law. A Mason, he was a member of the Cœur de Leon Commandery of the Knights Templar.^[1]

Personal life

On August 25, 1841, Schack was married to Elizabeth Inez McCarty (1826–1910),^[4] a daughter of Peter McCarty, a descendant of one of the Earls of Clancarty,^[5] and Eliza Ann (née Sanders) McCarty. Her sister, Augusta, was married to Jacob Little and was the mother of Lt. William McCarty Little.^[6] Together, they lived at 173 Madison Avenue and were the parents of:^[7]

• Rudolph Wilhelm Schack (1845–1889), who married Minna Swift Livingston, daughter of Charles James Livingston, in 1879.^[8][9]
• Albert Peter Schack (1847–1926), a graduate of Columbia College School of Mines and professor who died unmarried.^[10]
• Constance Elise Schack (1852 —1937),^[7] who married Col. Archibald Gracie IV, son of Confederate Brig.-Gen. Archibald Gracie III, in 1890.^[11] After his death she married Signor Raphael d'Arbiue,^[12] a musician and painter who had represented himself as a Count. He fled later, and, Mrs. Gracie said, had taken $5,000 worth of her jewels. It was brought out then that he was not a Count, but a dishwasher."^[13]
• Augusta Temple Schack (1853 —1920),^[14] who married George William Merritt, son of George Merritt, in 1881.^[15] After his death she married piano manufacturer William Dalliba Dutton in 1911.^[16][17]

Schack died at his residence in New York City on September 1, 1875. After a funeral at New Jerusalem Church on 35th Street in Manhattan, he was buried at Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn.^[1] His widow died on March 5, 1910, at 120 East 25th Street, which was then her residence in New York.^[5]

References

Notes

1. Schack is sometimes listed as Count Otto Wilhelm Christian Schack, but contemporaneous documents do not refer to him as a Count or a member of the German von Schack family.

Sources

1. "OBITUARY.; RICHARD M. BLATCHFORD. MR. OTTO WILHELM CHRISTIAN SCHACK. GEN. JAMES A. HERRIMAN". The New York Times. 5 September 1875. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
2. Weilbach, Philip (1897). Nyt dansk kunstnerlexikon: bd. Indelandske kunstnere (fortsaeftelse) Udenlandske kunstnere, som have arbejdet eller studeret for en tid i Danmark. Tilføjelser og rettelser (in Danish). Gyldendal. pp. 339–340. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
3. Dansk biografisk lexikon: tillige omfattende Norge for tidsrummet 1537-1814 (in Danish). Gyldendalske Boghandels Forlag (F. Hegel & Søn). 1901. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
4. Wendt, Simon (10 November 2016). Extraordinary Ordinariness: Everyday Heroism in the United States, Germany, and Britain, 1800-2015. Campus Verlag. p. 161. ISBN 978-3-593-50617-3. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
5. "Obituary Notes". The New York Times. March 7, 1910. p. 9. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
6. Appeals, New York (State) Court of (1881). New York Court of Appeals. Records and Briefs. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
7. TIMES, Special to THE NEW YORK (13 December 1937). "MRS. C. S. GRACIE OF WASHINGTON; Widow of Col.Archibald Gracie, Titanic Survivor, Dies at the Age of 85 ONCE ACTIVE IN SOCIETY Known in Early Years for Her Philanthropies - Whole Family Died Before Her". The New York Times. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
8. Davis, Howland; Kelly, Arthur C. M. (1995). A Livingston Genealogical Register. Kinship. p. F-55. ISBN 978-1-56012-136-7. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
9. The New York Genealogical and Biographical Record. New York Genealogical and Biographical Society. 1984. p. 29. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
10. "REVIEWS HIS CAREER IN SEVEN-PAGE WILL; Testament of Albert P. Shack Tells of His Call to the "New Christian Church." TAKES BURIAL PRECAUTIONS He Wants Two Physicians to Make Sure He Is Dead -- Sister Gets Estate". The New York Times. 15 April 1926. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
11. Gracie, Archibald (1911). The Truth about Chickamauga. Houghton Mifflin. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
12. "MRS. GRACIE TO-MARRY.; Colonel's Widow to Wed Raphael D'Arblue, Musician and Painter". The New York Times. 7 February 1925. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
13. Times, Special to The New York (1 July 1925). "MRS. DE URBINA SAYS HUSBAND BEAT HER; Widow of Col. Gracie, a Titanic Victim, Complains to Washington Police". The New York Times. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
14. "Obituary -- DUTTON". The New York Times. 27 February 1920. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
15. "TWO FASHIONABLE WEDDINGS.; MERRITT-SCHACK AND CAMPBELL-PARKER-- THE GUESTS AND THE DRESSES". The New York Times. 27 October 1881. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
16. Dwight, Benjamin Woodbridge (1874). The History of the Descendants of John Dwight, of Dedham, Mass. J. F. Trow & son, printers and bookbinders. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
17. Cutter, William Richard (1913). New England Families, Genealogical and Memorial: A Record of the Achievements of Her People in the Making of Commonwealths and the Founding of a Nation. Lewis Historical Publishing Company. p. 252. Retrieved 11 March 2022.

External links

• Otto Wilhelm Christian Schack at Find a Grave