Enthusiasm, both immediate and lasting, indicated to the Managing
Director of the Society, Mr. John F. Tucker, that he might progress
hopefully toward an ideal he had, for some time, envisioned. The goal
lay in the establishing of a memorial to the author who had transmuted
realistic New York into romantic Bagdad-by-the-Subway.
When, therefore, in December, 1918, Mr. Tucker called a committee for
the purpose of considering such a memorial, he met a glad response. The
first question, "What form shall the monument assume?" drew tentative
suggestions of a needle in Gramercy Square, or a tablet affixed to the
corner of O. Henry's home in West Twenty-sixth Street. But things of
iron and stone, cold and dead, would incongruously commemorate the
dynamic power that moved the hearts of living men and women, "the master
pharmacist of joy and pain," who dispensed "sadness tinctured with a
smile and laughter that dissolves in tears."
In short, then, it was decided to offer a minimum prize of $250 for the
best short story published in 1919, and the following Committee of Award
was appointed:
BLANCHE COLTON WILLIAMS, Ph.D.
EDWARD J. WHEELER, Litt.D.
ETHEL WATTS MUMFORD
ROBERT WILSON NEAL, M.A.
MERLE ST. CROIX WRIGHT, D.D.
It is significant that this committee had no sooner begun its round
table conferences than the Society promised, through the Director, funds
for two prizes. The first was fixed at $500, the second at $250.
At a meeting in January, 1919, the Committee of Award agreed upon the
further conditions that the story must be the work of an American
author, and must first appear in 1919 in an American publication.
Pages:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25