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40-511: The Rugged Path is a 1945 play by Robert E. Sherwood . The initial production marked a return to the stage by Spencer Tracy under the direction of Garson Kanin . This article on a play from the 1940s is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Robert E. Sherwood He is the author of Waterloo Bridge , Idiot's Delight , Abe Lincoln in Illinois , There Shall Be No Night , and The Best Years of Our Lives . He

80-705: A Private railroad car that can be charted and attached to most Amtrak trains across the United States. Beebe and Clegg wrote about and photographed the Virginia & Truckee Railroad and worked unsuccessfully with other railroad fans to preserve it. Their fame was such that they were caricatured in "Fiddletown & Copperopolis," by Carl Fallberg. Beebe was a noted partisan of the Cunard Line and passenger liner travel in general. He wrote several articles about trans-Atlantic passage on Cunard ships during

120-596: A 1949 Bancroft Prize . Sherwood is credited with originating the phrase that eventually evolved to "arsenal of democracy", a frequent catchphrase in Roosevelt's wartime speeches. Sherwood was quoted on May 12, 1940, by The New York Times , "This country is already, in effect, an arsenal for the democratic Allies." After serving as director of the Overseas Branch of the Office of War Information from 1943 until

160-423: A 1957 TV adaptation on TV. Sherwood publicly ridiculed isolationist Charles Lindbergh as a " Nazi with a Nazi's Olympian contempt for all democratic processes". During this period Sherwood also served as a speechwriter for President Franklin D. Roosevelt . He recounted the experience in his book Roosevelt and Hopkins: An Intimate History , which won the 1949 Pulitzer Prize for Biography or Autobiography and

200-599: A big message and end up with nothing but good entertainment.” Sherwood was actively engaged with the advocacy for writers' rights within the theatre world. From 1937 to 1939, Sherwood served as the seventh president of the Dramatists Guild of America . Sherwood's Broadway success soon attracted the attention of Hollywood; he began writing for movies in 1926. While some of his work went uncredited, his films included many adaptations of his plays. He also collaborated with Alfred Hitchcock and Joan Harrison in writing

240-402: A comedy concerning Hannibal's botched invasion of Rome, introduced one of his favorite themes : the futility of war. Many of his later dramatic works employed variations of this theme, including Idiot's Delight (1936), which won Sherwood the first of four Pulitzer Prizes . According to legend, he once admitted to the gossip columnist Lucius Beebe : “The trouble with me is that I start with

280-716: A community activist while living in Nevada. He was appointed by Nevada's governor to be a member of the Nevada State Centennial Committee (1958) and was Chairman of the Silver Centennial Monument Committee, groups that planned events honoring Nevada's and Virginia City's history. Through their efforts, the federal government commissioned a commemorative stamp in recognition of the discovery of the Comstock Lode in

320-767: A journalist for the New York Herald Tribune , the San Francisco Examiner , the Boston Telegram , and the Boston Evening Transcript , and was a contributing writer to many magazines such as Gourmet , The New Yorker , Town and Country , Holiday , American Heritage , and Playboy . Beebe re-launched Nevada 's first newspaper, the Territorial Enterprise , in 1952. He wrote

360-754: A regular basis. He also liked ties, particularly from Charvet in Paris, men's hats and wrote of the history of the bowler hat . In 1940, Beebe met Charles Clegg while both were houseguests at the Washington, D.C., home of Evalyn Walsh McLean . The two soon developed a personal and professional relationship that continued for the rest of Beebe's life. Previously, Beebe had been involved with society photographer Jerome Zerbe . The pair initially lived in New York City, where both men were prominent in café society circles. Eventually tiring of that social life,

400-609: A syndicated column for the New York Herald Tribune , from the 1930s through 1944, called This New York. The column chronicled the doings of fashionable society at such storied restaurants and nightclubs as El Morocco , the 21 Club , the Stork Club , and The Colony . Beebe is credited with popularizing the term " cafe society ", which was used to describe the people mentioned in his column. In 1950, Beebe and his long-time romantic partner, photographer Charles Clegg , moved to Virginia City, Nevada, where they purchased and restored

440-428: A wide audience, describing Beebe & Clegg's photography as depicting railroads as "heroic". Beebe & Clegg's work is positively noted by critics for its photography of various shortline railroads. A negative criticism of Beebe & Clegg's photography has noted their use of analog photograph manipulation and misattribution of sources when using other people's photographs. Modern retrospectives have also studied

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480-530: The 21 Club , Simpson's-in-the-Strand , and Chasen's . Also a wine aficionado, he was a member of the Confrérie des Chevaliers du Tastevin . In addition to his work as a journalist, Beebe wrote over 35 books. These dealt primarily with railroading and café society. He was the first writer to use a painting by Howard L. Fogg , noted railroad artist, on the cover of a book. Many of his railroad books were written with his longtime companion Charles Clegg. Beebe

520-697: The Gold Coast and The Virginia City . The Gold Coast, Georgia Northern / Central of Georgia No. 100, was built in 1905 and is now at the California State Railroad Museum . After Beebe and Clegg purchased The Virginia City , they had it refurbished and redecorated by famed Hollywood set designer Robert T. Hanley in a style known as Venetian Renaissance Baroque . Beebe in the Virginia City The Virginia City has been restored and currently operates as

560-544: The Maryland and Pennsylvania Railroad covered by a photo spread in Life . Beebe and Clegg were attired in formal wear and top hats , as waiters served champagne and caviar to their guests riding in an open car behind an ancient steam locomotive. Beebe's book The Trains We Rode (1965) used more than 1,500 photos and illustrations to chronicle the passing era of famous named passenger trains and streamliners , along with

600-423: The "Golden Era" of the 1920s, 30s and 40s. A noted boulevardier , Beebe had an impressive and baroque wardrobe. Beebe's clothing included 40 suits, at least two mink-lined overcoats, numerous top hats and bowlers, a collection of doeskin gloves, walking sticks and a substantial gold nugget watch chain. Columnist Walter Winchell referred to Beebe and his wardrobe as "Luscious Lucius". Beebe's sartorial splendor

640-467: The 1935 Boston and the Boston Legend with local Bostonians having made parlor games out of noting errors in the text; although the book was also praised for capturing the spirit of the city and its culture. Modern critique on the photography of Beebe & Clegg is generally positive. The Center for Railroad Photography & Art notes their books as bringing the subject of rail photography to

680-668: The Piper family home and later purchased the dormant Territorial Enterprise newspaper. The newspaper was relaunched in 1952, and by 1954 had achieved the highest circulation in the West for a weekly newspaper. Beebe and Clegg co-wrote the That Was the West series of historical essays for the newspaper. In 1960, Beebe began work with the San Francisco Chronicle , where he wrote a syndicated column, This Wild West . During

720-602: The Virginia City region. Clegg and Beebe sold the Territorial Enterprise in 1961 and purchased a home in suburban San Francisco. They continued the writing, photography, and travel that had marked their lives until Beebe's death. Beebe died at the age of 63 of a sudden heart attack at his winter home in Hillsborough, California, (near San Francisco) on Friday, February 4, 1966. A memorial service

760-517: The conclusion of the war, he returned to dramatic writing with the movie The Best Years of Our Lives , directed by William Wyler . The 1946 film, which explores changes in the lives of three soldiers after they return home from war, earned Sherwood an Academy Award for Best Screenplay. Sherwood stood 6 feet 8 inches (2.03 m) tall. Dorothy Parker, who was 5 feet 4 inches (1.63 m), once commented that when she, Sherwood, and Robert Benchley (6 feet (1.8 m)) walked down

800-628: The editor throughout 1952 from local railfans noting the errors in Beebe's text, particularly complaining that Beebe claimed the railroad was "nameless" when it was historically known to have been part of the Wasatch & Jordan Valley Railroad. Beebe also claimed the upper portions of the Little Cottonwood Canyon line were inoperable under steam power and could only operate as a gravity tramway with uphill loads hauled by mules , which

840-561: The market for future rail history authors. In a positive retrospective, Kevin P. Keefe a columnist for Classic Trains Magazine noted the availability of Beebe's writing in the form of coffee table books allowed wider recognition of rail history subjects to casual enthusiasts. Trains Magazine columnist Fred Frailey in a positive review described Beebe's text with "You either love it or hate it, and I wouldn’t have him any other way." Outside of railroad books, Lucius Beebe received criticism from Boston, Massachusetts locals for his claims in

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880-474: The popular series, interviewed in one episode American football player Howard Scala, a member of the NFL's Green Bay Packers . Impressed by Scala's own considerable height, Marx shared the following anecdote with the show's audience: Reminds me of Bob Sherwood, the playwright, he's an old friend of mine; and he's six-foot-five and very thin. I said to him one day 'Bob, what do you say to people when they ask you how

920-550: The same age that Beebe had reached when he died. Lucius Beebe & Charles Cleggs's railroad books have come under scrutiny for their prose and reliance on anecdotal history both from contemporaries and historians since their deaths. A 1947 review of Mixed Train Daily praised the book for its broad scope and striking photography but criticized the text for its "pompous" tone, authorial biases and dubious claims. Railway & Locomotive Historical Society (RLHS) founder Charles Fisher

960-613: The screenplay for Rebecca (1940). With Europe in the midst of World War II, Sherwood set aside his anti-war stance to support the fight against the Third Reich . There Shall Be No Night , his 1940 play about the Soviet Union's invasion of Finland, was produced by the Playwright's Company that he co-founded, and it starred Alfred Lunt , Lynn Fontanne , and Montgomery Clift . Katharine Cornell produced and starred in

1000-573: The six years that he wrote the column, Beebe covered such topics as economics, politics, journalism, religion, history, morals, justice , finance, and travel. Beebe was a noted gourmand . He had his own column, Along the Boulevards, in Gourmet , and wrote extensively for Holiday and Playboy about restaurants and dining experiences around the world. Some of the restaurants he covered include The Colony, The Stork Club , The Pump Room ,

1040-566: The stations they served. For example, he proclaimed Baltimore's Mount Royal Station , built in the early 1890s, as "one of the celebrated railroad stations of the world, ranking in renown with Euston Station, London , scene of so many of Sherlock Holmes ' departures, the Gare du Nord in Paris, and the feudal fortress of the Pennsylvania Railroad at Broad Street, Philadelphia ." Along with Clegg, Beebe owned two private railcars,

1080-405: The street together, they resembled "a walking pipe organ." When asked at a party how long he had known Sherwood, Benchley stood on a chair, raised his hand to the ceiling, and said "I knew Bob Sherwood back when he was only this tall." In 1949, comedian Groucho Marx also commented about Sherwood's height during a filmed radio broadcast of the quiz show You Bet Your Life . Groucho, who hosted

1120-400: The two moved in 1950 to Virginia City, Nevada, a tiny community that had once been a fabled mining boomtown. There, they reactivated and began publishing the Territorial Enterprise , a fabled 19th-century newspaper that had once been the employer of Mark Twain . Beebe and Clegg shared a renovated mansion in the town, traveled extensively, and remained prominent in social circles. Beebe was

1160-765: The weather is up there?' He said 'I spit in their eye and tell ‘em it's raining.' Sherwood died of a heart attack in New York City in 1955. A production of Small War on Murray Hill , his final work, debuted on Broadway at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre on January 3, 1957. Sherwood was portrayed by actor Nick Cassavetes in Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle , a 1994 movie about the Algonquin Round Table. Lucius Beebe Lucius Morris Beebe (December 9, 1902 – February 4, 1966)

1200-654: Was a screenwriter on the adapted films Rebecca and The Bishop's Wife . He received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama (1936, 1939, 1941) , an Academy Award for Best Screenplay (1947) and a Pulitzer Prize for Biography (1948). Born in 1896 in New Rochelle, New York , Robert was a son of Arthur Murray Sherwood, a rich stockbroker, and his wife, the former Rosina Emmet , a highly accomplished illustrator and portrait painter known as Rosina E. Sherwood. His paternal grandmother, Mary Elizabeth Wilson Sherwood ,

1240-478: Was an American writer, gourmand, photographer, railroad historian, journalist, and syndicated columnist . Beebe was born in Wakefield, Massachusetts , to a prominent Boston family. He attended both Harvard University and Yale University , where he contributed to the campus newspaper, Harvard Crimson , and the humor magazine , The Yale Record . During his tenures at boarding school and university, Beebe

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1280-707: Was an author and social leader. He was a great-great-grandson of the former New York State Attorney General Thomas Addis Emmet and a great-grandnephew of the Irish nationalist Robert Emmet , who was executed for high treason after leading the Irish rebellion of 1803 , one of a series of attempts to dislodge British rule in Ireland , in 1803. His relatives also included three other notable American portrait artists: his aunts, Lydia Field Emmet and Jane Emmet de Glehn , and his first cousin, once removed, Ellen Emmet Rand . Sherwood

1320-628: Was an outspoken critic of Beebe's writing and compiled several lists of factual errors he found in it. Beebe in an interview with Railroad Magazine responded to the criticism by saying "Neither Clegg nor I have ever been a member of the tractive-force and cylinder-dimension contingent of railfans. We prefer the beauty and romantic aspects of railroading" A November 1951 article written by Beebe in Trains Magazine focusing railroads in Utah's Little Cottonwood Canyon received several letters to

1360-717: Was educated at Fay School , Milton Academy and then Harvard University . He fought with the Royal Highlanders of Canada, CEF in Europe during World War I and was wounded. After his return to the United States, he began working as a movie critic for magazines, including Life and Vanity Fair . Sherwood's career as a critic in the 1920s is discussed in the 2009 documentary For the Love of Movies: The Story of American Film Criticism . In this film Time critic Richard Schickel discusses, among other topics, how Sherwood

1400-521: Was held three days later, on Monday, February 7, at 11:00 a.m. at Emmanuel Church on Newbury Street in Boston. His ashes, reportedly along with those of two of his dogs, were returned to Massachusetts and are buried in Lakeside Cemetery on North Avenue in his hometown of Wakefield, in one of the Beebe family plots, at the extreme north end of the cemetery. Clegg died by suicide in 1979, at

1440-587: Was inducted into the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame in 1992. Beebe wrote extensively about the joys of train travel, including such nostalgic books describing quaint short line railroads as Mixed Train Daily (1947) and Narrow Gauge in the Rockies (1958). During the filming of Union Pacific with V&T 11 in 1938, Beebe was reportedly on set as an advisor during shooting near Iron Springs, Utah. In September, 1947, he arranged an excursion on

1480-674: Was known for his numerous pranks. One of his more outrageous stunts included an attempt at festooning J. P. Morgan 's yacht Corsair III with toilet paper from a chartered airplane. His pranks were not without consequence, and he proudly noted that he had the sole distinction of having been expelled from both Harvard and Yale, at the insistence, respectively, of the president and dean. Beebe earned his undergraduate degree from Harvard in 1926, only to be expelled during graduate school. During and immediately after obtaining his degree from Harvard , Beebe published several books of poetry, but eventually found his true calling in journalism. He worked as

1520-630: Was only partially correct as the line was rebuilt in later years to allow steam use. Historian Carl W. Condit writing for the RLHS' Railroad History in 1980 critiqued Beebe & Clegg and their imitators for their lack of editorial oversight, while exploring the unique relationship between historiography and the railfan community. Condit was particularly critical of Beebe & Clegg's lack of technical knowledge of railroading and various factual errors perpetuated in Beebe & Clegg's text. Condit did positively note however Beebe's influence in opening

1560-406: Was recognized when he appeared in full formal day attire on the cover of Life over the title of "Lucius Beebe Sets a Style". Many of Beebe's articles and columns addressed men's traditional fashion. He was especially fond of English bespoke tailoring and shoes and wrote glowing articles about noted court tailor Henry Poole & Company and noted bootmaker John Lobb , whom he patronized on

1600-632: Was the first New York critic invited to Hollywood by cross-country train to meet the stars and directors. Sherwood was one of the original members of the Algonquin Round Table . He was close friends with Dorothy Parker and Robert Benchley , who were on the staff of Vanity Fair with Sherwood when the Round Table began meeting in 1919. Author Edna Ferber was also a good friend. In 1920, Sherwood became editor of Life . Sherwood's first Broadway play, The Road to Rome (1927),

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