Oriska Worden (July 13, 1868 – October 1, 1954), born Oriska Haverfield, was an American actress and singer.
Early life and education
Oriska Haverfield was born in
Cadiz, Ohio
Cadiz ( ) is a village in Cadiz Township, Harrison County, Ohio, United States located about 20 miles from Steubenville. The population was 3,353 at the 2010 census. It is the county seat of Harrison County.
History
Cadiz was founded in 1803 a ...
, the daughter of George A. Haverfield and Mattie Elna Warman Haverfield. Her father was a disabled veteran of the
American Civil War; he died in 1886. Her mother remarried, to Col. Frederick W. Worden in 1888; her stepfather's brother was Admiral
John Lorimer Worden.
As a young woman, Oriska Worden helped her mother, a physician and orthopedic surgeon who ran "a summer sanitarium and school of physical culture" in Michigan.
Worden attended the
Mount du Chantal convent school in West Virginia,
and studied voice at the Michigan State Normal Conservatory of Music in
Ypsilanti, Michigan, graduating in 1892. She pursued further musical studies in Paris with Belgian singer
Jacques Bouhy
Jacques-Joseph-André Bouhy (18 June 1848 – 29 January 1929) was a Belgian baritone, most famous for being the first to sing the "Toreador Song" in the role of Escamillo in the opera ''Carmen''.
Bouhy was born in Pepinster. After studying at th ...
.
Career
Worden sang with the Castle Square Opera Company of Boston, early in her career.
In 1897, she toured in the American West with a stock company.
In 1899, she modeled and spoke about "the new French tight-fitting skirt" for a newspaper feature.
On Broadway she appeared in ''The Supper Club'' (1901-1902) and in ''My Lady Molly'' (1904). In 1905, she was in
vaudeville starring in ''The Queen's Fan'', an
operetta
Operetta is a form of theatre and a genre of light opera. It includes spoken dialogue, songs, and dances. It is lighter than opera in terms of its music, orchestral size, length of the work, and at face value, subject matter. Apart from its s ...
. She was in a comic opera, ''Burning to Sing'', in vaudeville in 1907.
Worden taught at the summer school of the
Petoskey Normal Conservatory in 1899. In 1908, she began teaching voice students at a studio in Carnegie Building in New York. In 1912, she announced that she was directing a theatrical costuming department for Renard's in New York.
Personal life
Worden married William P. Baird in Tennessee in 1884. She married wealthy Charles W. Glover in 1892. In 1901 she announced that she would sue his parents for
alienation of affection, and Glover himself for
alimony,
after they were divorced in 1895.
She owned property in Petoskey, Michigan, until she sold it in 1915. Her third husband was John Breidinger; they married in New York in 1923. Oriska Breidinger died in 1954, at the age of 86, in
Hempstead, New York.
[New York Department of Health; Albany, NY; ''NY State Death Index.'' via Ancestry.]
References
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Worden, Oriska
Singers from Ohio
20th-century American actresses
American vaudeville performers
1868 births
1954 deaths
People from Cadiz, Ohio
Mount de Chantal Visitation Academy alumni