John T. Raymond

Who was John T. Raymond?

John T. Raymond, whose true name was John O'Brien, was an American stage actor, born in Buffalo, N. Y., on August 5, 1836; he died in Evansville, Indiana on April 10, 1887. His first appearance was made on June 27, 1853, at a theatre in Rochester, New York, under the management of Messrs., Carr and Henry Warren, as Lopez, in "The Honeymoon." Afterward, he went to Philadelphia, Baltimore, Charleston, Savannah, Mobile. and New Orleans. In 1858 he made his early success with Sothern in Tom Taylor's Our American Cousin, in which he afterward appeared in London and in Paris. Raymond first became known in New York in 1861, when he appeared at Laura Keene's Theatre, succeeding Joseph Jefferson in low comedy parts, and at that time he acted Asa Trenchard in "Our American Cousin." His greatest popular hit, however, was as Col. Mulberry Sellers in a dramatization of Mark Twain's Gilded Age', a character that became completely identified with his own breezy optimism. Raymond's professional career extended over a period of thirty-two years, in the course of which he acted in all the parts that usually fall to the lot of a low comedian.

Raymond was twice married, his first wife being Marie E.