File:USSR 1948-08-09 cover to USA (V).jpg

English: USSR 1948-08-09 cover Odessa to Highland Park, USA.

The Bunte Family. The Bunte Brothers Candy Company was founded in 1876 on State Street in Chicago. Oscar Bunte’s father, Gustav Bunte, started the company with his brother Ferdinand and a Mr. Charles A. Spoehr. By 1910 the company had revenues of over $2.4 million and employed as many as 1,200 people. Ferdinand passed in 1920, and Gustav in 1923; prior to their passing, Oscar’s cousin Theodore took charge of the company in 1917. The company was eventually purchased by a candy company out of St. Louis in 1954, but the legacy of the businesses success was long‐ lasting in the Chicago area. (Dictionary of Leading Chicago Businesses ‘1820‐2000’, The Electronic Encyclopedia of Chicago, Chicago Historical Society) While his family was known for their business success in Chicago, Oscar’s name appeared in the news papers for other reasons, including personal scandal. In 1922, Oscar Bunte was identified by Mrs. Mabel Rockwell Schaeffer as the “guardian and advisor in financial matters” to herself, a supposed “English heiress” with a mysterious past, a drug addiction, and a husband. Mrs. Schaeffer was a person of interest in a drug scandal involving the Illinois General Hospital; claims were made that she was receiving far more supply than what was needed to suffice her cravings and cure her addiction to “dope.” Mrs. Schaeffer would eventually publicly denounce her marriage and claim that Mr. Oscar Bunte was her keeper, and that she depended on his friendship and support. Mrs. Schaeffer was spending time after her arrest for drug possession in a Chicago mental hospital.

At the passing of his mother, Philippine Bunte, in 1933 Oscar and his siblings inherited his mother’s wealth and what she had inherited from Gustav. By this time Oscar has moved from the family business to serving as the president of the Protectu Banknote Corporation, a position he held until his own death in 1953. Oscar Bunte founded Protectu Banknote Corporation in 1918; they manufactured banking and business stationary. Six years after his mother’s death, and fourteen prior to his own, Mr. Bunte commissioned the architectural firm of Olsen & Urbain, out of Chicago, to design for him a Highland Park home. Oscar Bunte left behind a widow, Anna, and was buried within Graceland Cemetery. (Various Chicago Daily Tribune Archives).