Jesse Lynch Williams

Jesse Lynch WIlliams was an American playwright and author, best known for winning the first ever Pulitzer Prize for Drama. Born in Sterling, Illinois on August 17, 1871, Williams was raised in a literary family. His father was a pastor of a Presbyterian church, writing Early Mackinac and editing a Presbyterian journal. Williams studied at Beloit Academy and began his literary career in college. He won the Nassau Literary Magazine short story contest in his junior year and received his bachelor's degree in 1892. Williams went on to graduate school at Princeton University, where he wrote Princeton Stories (1895), which often featured the life of an undergraduate football player.

Williams went on to work as a reporter for The Sun (New York City) in 1893 while continuing to write fiction. He began writing a number of short stories in 1890 and had written four plays and six novels by 1929. His most famous work is Why Marry (1917) was produced on Broadway and won the first ever Pulitzer Prize for Drama. His other plays Why Not (1922) and Lovely Ladies (1925) were produced on Broadway and continued his success. Williams was a member of the Authors League of America and the National Institute of Arts and Letters. Jesse Lynch Williams died on September 14, 1929 of a heart attack at the home of Assistant Secretary of the Navy Theodore Douglas Robinson.