Ullie Akerstrom

Ullie R. Akerstrom (March 17, 1864 – August 10, 1941), born Ulrika Akerstrom, was an American actress, dancer, playwright, and vaudeville performer. (Her gravesite in New York gives her birth year as 1870. Her career beginning in the mid-1880s makes the earlier published date more plausible.)

Ulrika Akerstrom was born and raised in New York City.

Akerstrom began in variety shows in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. She acted in shows including Fanchon the Cricket, The Pearl of Savoy, The Hidden Hand, Annette, the Dancing Girl (1889, her New York debut), Renah, the Gipsey's Daughter, A Little Busybody (1891), A Strange Marriage, Under the City Lights (1898), A Beautiful Slave, a Waif of London (1898), and A Bachelor's Housekeeper (1898).

Akerstrom wrote several plays and sketches during her performing years, including Viola, the Street Singer (1886), Renah, the Gipsey's Daughter (1886), Annette the Dancing Girl (1889), Miss Rosa, A Pauper's Fortune (1893), Queen of the Arena (1893), A Woman's Vengeance (1895), The Story of a Crime (1895), That Smith Gal, Little Busybody, The Egyptian Dancer, and The Doctor's Warm Reception (1901). Akerstrom also published a book of popular verse, "Toot Yer Horn", and Other Poems (1888).

She retired from the stage in 1903 and lived in Brooklyn, writing sketches, plays, and lyrics. She also produced shows. Works by Akerstrom from this period included A Doctor by Courtesy; or, A Jolly Mixup (1906), The Widow (1910), St. Elmo (1910), The Plot (1910), An Election Episode (1910), Adventures; or, The Woman Hater (1910), Vashti; or, Until Death Do Us Part (1910), The Reckoning (1911), Mental Suggestion; or, Made in Germany (1911), Mrs. Murphy's Second Husband (1911), Natasha (1911), The Eleventh Hour; or, Two Sisters (1911), A Story of the Hills (1911), The Wager (1912), The Sultan's Daughter (1912), The Sultan's Favorite (1912), Sunshine (1912), Our New Girl (1912), The Red Mask (1913), Caught with the Goods (1915), Over the Hills to the Poor House (1921),The Haunted Fliver; or, What's the Answer (1935) and Call of the King (1938).

She moved to Florida by 1935, but remained active in local theatrical productions, as a performer, writer and producer.

Ullie Akerstrom married her manager, Gus Bernard, by 1899; he died in 1915. She married again, to George Howard Melius. She died in 1941, in Willsboro, New York, aged 77 years.