Hüseyin Sayram

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Hüseyin Sayram (b. 1905 - d 23 December 1988)

The second of the three sons of Hadji Zühtü Efendi.^[1] He also has a younger and older sister. He is the starter of the Sayram family line. His name, Hüseyin is a variety of the Arabic name Hossain, "the younger handsome/beautiful one". It is important to note that the beauty referred here is the aesthetic beauty of the God's creation and nothing to do with the lust as it is equated with today.^[2] Young Hüseyin was born into a family of a long line of professors of Muslim theology. He had a fierce positivistic intellect and with an ear for music. He was also an accomplished athlete, a sprinter. Hüseyin was born around 1905 in Kayseri, Turkey. A market city of merchants. His elder brother Ibrahim, was conscripted to the war in Gallipoli during the opening stages of the First World War, which has a lasting impact on the family psyche. When he returned, it seems that he was suffering from PTSD and a deep hatred towards anything that represented Western values that appeared to him as decadent and evil. He lived the remainder of his days as a bitter, broken man.^[3] To complicate the matters further, the young Turkish republic, having defended their honor against the so called invincible Western powers, had chosen to adopt the western ways of positivism, learning, science and industrialization. Young Hüseyin embraced these changes while his family found it difficult. This led to a schism continuing up to this day in the family psyche.^[4] Hüseyin completed the Sivas Teacher's College. He later obtained a musicology course. He was a talented poly instrumentalist and a had a baritone voice. He was appointed as a music teacher at the religious Imam and Preaching College and caused a stir when he introduced violin lessons to preaching students. He was an active leader of the Republican People's Party, founded by Kemal Atatürk.^[5] Hüseyin chose the surname Sayram when a legislation was introduced that every Turkish citizen would have a surname. The family tradition says that he came across this obscure and archaic Turkish word in the Kutadgu Bilig (The Holy Knowledge) an 11th Century Turkish Encyclopedia by Yusuf Hass Hadjib, meaning a "musicologist".

After graduating from the Teacher's College, Hüseyin married to Emine, a young woman of Circassian ethnic background who bore him four children. She died ata young age due to complications of a gall bladder operation. Hüseyin raised their four children on his ow. He never remarried and remained celibate after his wife died. He sid he had mourned for her for the rest of his life.

Hüseyin Sayram was active in community and political life. During the early years of the republic when the country was ruled by a one party system and there was no radio reception in Kayseri, he performed daily music programs from the PA facility of the local "People's House" (Halkevi), performing with a friend. His activities in raising the local culture, arts and music, also his personality gained him considerable respect from the local community.^[6]

Hüseyin Sayram was repeatedly elected as the regional Chief of the Republican People's Party (Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi-CHP). He was influential in getting elected three of the 8 MP's allocated to the Kayseri province electoral area throughout all the elections he entered. A turning point was in 1965 when Turhan Feyzioglu, one of his proteges left the RPP and formed his own Trust Party (Güven Partisi).^[7]

After the military coup in 1980, the RPP was banned by the military junta and Sayram temporarily retired from political life. He became the provincial head of the newly formed Populist Party (Halkçi Parti). He remained politically active throughout his life and was the oldest provincial party leader at the age of 83 before retiring from politics. Hüseyin Sayram died in 23 December 1988.^[8]