Background
Osborne was born in Westport, New York, the younger son of John C. Osborne and Mary E. Rail. His parents were both immigrants, his father from England and his mother from Canada.
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Osborne was born in Westport, New York, the younger son of John C. Osborne and Mary E. Rail. His parents were both immigrants, his father from England and his mother from Canada.
Osborne studied medicine at the University of Vermont and graduated in 1880.
He was then hired as a surgeon by the Union Pacific Railroad, and moved to Rawlins, Carbon County, Wyoming. In 1883, Osborne was elected to Wyoming"s House of the Territorial Assembly, but resigned in 1885, when he left the Territory for a brief period. In 1888, he was appointed chairman of the Penitentiary Building Commission and also elected mayor of Rawlins.
During the 1880s, Osborne was a physician and chemist in Rawlins, and operated a farm, at one point being the largest individual sheep owner in Wyoming.
After the lynching of Big Nose George Parrott, Osborne helped conduct the autopsy, and had Parrot"s skin tanned and made into a pair of shoes he later allegedly wore at his inauguration as governor. Osborne was an alternate delegate to the Democratic National Convention in 1892.
That same year, amidst unconfirmed claims of election irregularities, Osborne defeated Edward Ivinson in Wyoming"s second gubernatorial election since statehood. He completed his term on January 7, 1895, having declined renomination.
From March 4, 1897 until March 3, 1899, he served in the 55th United States Congress as the United States. Representative from Wyoming, but again declined renomination when his term expired.
They were the parents of a daughter, Jean Curtis Osborne. Osborne was appointed Assistant Secretary of State, serving the Wilson Administration from April 21, 1913 until December 14, 1915. He was also chairman of the board of the Rawlins National Bank, and engaged in stock raising.
He died in Rawlins on April 24, 1943, at the age of 84.
He is interred at the Smith family plot at Cedar Hill Cemetery in Princeton, Caldwell County, Kentucky.
Osborne was a Freemason and a member of the York Rite.