GOODMAN, KENNETH SAWYER

(1883-1918)

The privileged son of a Chicago lumber millionaire, Kenneth Sawyer Goodman was drawn away from his family business toward the arts. After working as a volunteer with the Art Institute of Chicago, Goodman crafted nearly 50 one-act plays, masques, andpageantsat the height of the Chicago arts and literary renaissance in the decade prior toWorldWar I. Goodman collaborated with both Ben Hecht andThomas Wood Stevens, but he also wrote many plays on his own, includingThe Game of Chess(1912) andBack of the Yards(1913). With Hecht, Goodman collaborated onThe Wonder Hat(1914) andThe Hero of Santa Maria(1915), the last of which was produced by theWashington Square Playersin 1917. His collaborations with Stevens were mostly masques and pageants. Poised to write a full-length play and working on a plan for a repertory theatre and drama school, Goodman died suddenly during the 1918 influenza epidemic while serving in the U.S. Navy. His untimely death may have cost the American theatre a significant playwright, but his passing led his grieving parents to establish Chicago's Goodman Theatre and school, a posthumous realization of their son's dream.