Martha 'Patty' Flandrau Selmes

(1861-1923)

Patty Flandrau was born on the Kentucky farm on August 14, 1861 and spent most of her childhood there.  She attended a boarding school in Cincinnati, Miss Nourse’s, where she became well-educated.  After she finished her schooling she began spending more time in St. Paul, Minnesota with her father and step-mother.  Eager to be married, she was engaged to Tilden R. Selmes on her 21st birthday.  After their wedding ceremony, which was held in the parlor of the Boone County house, the couple traveled to Chanta Wapka, Tilden’s ranch on the Heart River in the Dakota Territory.  It was there that she and her husband became friends with Theodore Roosevelt.  Through him, she struck up long-lasting acquaintances with his sisters and others in the Roosevelt circle.  

In 1885, Patty traveled back to Kentucky to give birth to her only child, a daughter, Isabella Dinsmore Selmes.  The small Selmes family lived a rather peripatetic life, moving from the Dakotas to St. Paul, and always spending their summers in Kentucky.  Tilden was diagnosed with liver cancer in 1895 and died in Kentucky. Patty remained in Kentucky to start up a ham business on Julia’s farm, while Isabella moved back to St. Paul to attend school.  From 1896 to the early 1900’s, Patty ran a ham and bacon business with Sally Wooley in Kentucky. Her friendship with Teddy Roosevelt helped secure a ham or two on the White House table. In 1901, mother and daughter moved to New York City where they lived with the Frank and Sarah ‘Sally’ Flandrau Cutcheon.  For the remainder of her life, Patty split her time between Sally’s homes, Boone County, and her daughter’s various homes in New York, New Mexico, and California.  She died in 1923 in New Mexico and is buried in the Dinsmore Graveyard.

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