William Haight Leggett

Citations

1. [S45] Findagrave.com, From his obituary in the Pontiac Press:
   Death Closes Music Career of City's Oldest Teacher
   "William Haight Leggett, 95, who taught music in Pontaic for over three-quarters of a century, died Sunday at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Emerson Dill, 3800 Walton Blvd, where he has made his home for the past few years, and which is the former Leggett homestead.
   Born at Clintonville, within a short distance of the place of his death, on March 3, 1859, he has been a resident of this area since, with the exception of six years which he spent in Paris under the tutorage of the violin masters, and a period in Detroit. While in Detroit he kept up his music classes in Pontiac.
   He inherited his love for music from his father, Mortimer A. Leggett, who came here from New York where he was born on the site of the present Empire State Building, and played the violin in order to promote community dancing parties in the Pontiac area.
   Mr. Leggett started playing the piano early in life, but changed to the violin when he began taking lessons from the late Conrad A. Hoffman, prominent Pontiac music teacher of the past century.
   Until he was past 90 years of age he maintained a down town studio here, and his pupils were numbered in the thousands. Many people today prominent in local music activites owe much of their progress to his tutorage.
   His collection of violins was one of the best in the nation. Most of them have been given by him to former pupils.
   As a hobby Mr. Leggett many years ago took up painting, and some of his work in water colors now occupy places in many homes in Pontiac and elsewhere.
   Early in life he was married to Eleanor Wright, now deceased. He is survived by a daughter, Florence Leggett of Washington, D.C.
   Service will be Tuesday at three o'clock at the Huntoon Funeral Home. Dr. W.H. Marbach will officiate, and burial will be in the Drayton Plaines cemetery.
2. [S35] 1900 United States Federal Census, Detroit, Wayne County, Michigan - 2nd Ward, Enumeration District 13, sheet 8, line 24.
3. [S35] 1900 United States Federal Census, Waterford Township, Oakland County, Michigan - Enumeration District 109, sheet 4, line 85.
4. [S25] The Washington Post, SENT PHOTOS OF NUDE
   Aged Husband’s Letters Read in Divorce Court.
   MOTHER TELLS OF MARRIAGE
   Mrs. William K. [H.] Leggett, of Detroit, Asks Freedom From Music Teacher Who Wooed and Won Her in Study Hours-Her Letters Show That Pair Were Happy for a Time.
   Special to the Washington Post.
   Detroit, Jan. 22.- “Who is a sweetheart? You are,” wrote young Mrs. Eleanor C. Leggett, to her elderly husband, William K. [H.] Leggett, Detroit music teacher, two years after their marriage. And she sent him a real kiss.
   Many letters from the girl-wife, written to her husband, 30 years older than herself, were read by Attorney Sloman in contradiction of the wife’s testimony that all was not well with them soon after their marriage.
   Mrs. Leggett raved of the beauties of the country, where she was spending some time with his relatives at The Willows, the country home of the Leggetts, at Drayton Plains. She saw an added beauty in the very blossoms, which, she said, “look like fairies.”
   Addressed as “My Own Darling.”
    “Loving you makes me love the things around me,” she wrote. She addressed him as “My Own Darling” and “My dearest One.”
   “Bless your dear heart,” she wrote, “I know you are happy, too, because we are to be established in our own home with our dear little girl.” And she goes on to say that Baby Florence had been rocked in the very cradle in which his own dear mother had rocked him when he was a baby.
   “How strange is life,” she said, “when things are changed in a twinkling. Men are just boys grown tall. Their hearts don’t change much after all. You will never change, for you are too full of life and ambition for higher development. You are so good to me.[”]
   “Now I will close, loving you more each day. Here are written kisses.” And there was a long string of them.
   Sends Him Kisses.
   Attorney Andrew L. Moore, Mrs. Leggett’s counsel, objected to the introduction of these letters. Judge Mandell allowed them, stating that they were permissible for the purpose of impeaching the witness, inasmuch as she had testified that her husband had been cruel, and these were a contradiction.
   Mr. Sloman asked Mrs. Leggett if she thought her husband had any wrong motive in sending her these cards, and she said:
   “I think so now, yes.” “Did he give you any reason to think so at the time?”
    “Yes, he did.”
   Mr. Sloman read one of the cards. It was a quotation from Stevenson.
   Mother on the Stand.
   Mrs. Laura Knight, of Royal Oak, mother of Mrs. Leggett, told of having found some letters about six months after her daughter’s marriage, written by Leggett to her daughter before their marriage.
   “It was all about soul-mating and such stuff as that,” she said.
   She also told of her first knowledge of the affair between her daughter and her music teacher about the day before the marriage took place. In a voice somewhat tremulous with emotion she related their conversation, which took place in her home.
   “I said to Mr. Leggett when I sent my little girl to him to take music lessons I thought that he was an honorable man; that he would not make love to her during lesson hours. He asked me if I could still think of him as an honorable man, and I told him no; that if he had learned to care for her he should have come to me. He said he was not a praying man, but that he had been down on his knees praying for the honor of his family. I told him that Eleanore did not care for him as a wife should, that it was simply girlish infatuation. I asked him to leave her alone for one year.”
   Didn’t Ask for Her.
   “Did he ask for her hand in marriage?” asked Mr. Moore? “He did not,” said Mrs. Knight.
   She told of how Eleanore had come to Detroit without her knowledge, and of her hunt for her in the city the night before the marriage occurred. She said she went to the Michigan Conservatory of Music, and also called up the Abel home, but was unable to locate her daughter. When she learned that the girl and Leggett had married, she was ill about a week, she testified.
   Mrs. Knight testified that “soul-mate” notes written by Leggett, which she found on her daughter’s dresser, opened her eyes to the state of affairs between the two.
   “I took my daughter on my lap and told her that she did not love him as a wife should love her husband,” she said. “I told her the music lessons would have to stop.”
   “What were the notes like?” Attorney Sloman asked on cross-examination. “They were trashy.” “You thought it was dishonorable on his part to want to marry your daughter?” “No, I thought it was dishonorable for a teacher to make love to his student during lesson hours.” Mr. Sloman asked her about the alleged teachings of “immorality” by Leggett before the marriage. This was ruled out, Attorney Moore objecting that no such charge had been made.
5. [S36] 1910 United States Federal Census, Waterford Township, Oakland County, Michigan - Enumeration District 154, sheet 10b, line 67.