Dakota Datebook: Maxwell Anderson

Feb. 28, 2019 — Today marks the anniversary of the death of Maxwell Anderson in 1959. He was one of the most important American playwrights of the 20th century.

Born in 1888, Anderson spent his first three years on a farm near Atlantic, Pa. His father worked as a railroad fireman while studying at night to become a Baptist minister. The family moved to Jamestown in 1907, where Anderson graduated from high school. Going on to UND, Anderson joined nearly every club related to writing and drama. For money, he waited tables and worked at the night copy desk of the Grand Forks Herald.

After getting his B.A. in English literature, Anderson moved to Minnewaukan, where he was the high school principal and English teacher. He was an avowed pacifist, and two years later he was fired for protesting World War I in front of his students. So he moved to Palo Alto, Calif., to get his masters from Stanford. He became chair of the English department at Whittier College near Los Angeles, but was fired again the following year for making public statements on behalf of a student seeking conscientious objector status.

Anderson decided it was time to get into a different business— newspaper reporting. He worked for several different papers in San Francisco and New York, and then began following a different calling— he penned his first play, “White Dessert.” It enjoyed only twelve performances, but it won the attention of Laurence Stallings, a reviewer for the New York World, and the two collaborated on a war comedy, “What Price Glory?” It was a giant hit and had a run of more than 430 performances. Anderson quit the newspaper business and went into writing plays full time.

In the next few years Anderson wrote many plays, and he also wrote radio shows and collaborated on screenplays for movies like “All Quiet on the Western Front” and “Death Takes a Holiday.”

During the 75th anniversary of the founding of UND in 1958, Anderson was conferred a Doctor of Humanities degree during the festivities. He was too ill to attend, but he wrote a letter saying the university had been there for him when he needed it very badly and thanked them for providing – in his words – a retreat for those more interested in the creation of beauty or the discovery of truth than in making a profit. He wrote, “If I hadn’t gone to the university, I might have been an unhappy and mediocre banker, farmer, or store-keeper. I’d have gone no farther.”

Maxwell Anderson died the following year after having a stroke. To honor the spirit of a man and his deeply held principles, we offer one of his most famous quotes:

“When a government takes over a people’s economic life it becomes absolute, and when it has become absolute, it destroys the arts, the minds, the liberties and the meaning of the people it governs.”

Maxwell Anderson may have lost jobs because of his words; but his words also made him a resounding success. He is a great North Dakota treasure.

“Dakota Datebook” is a radio series from Prairie Public in partnership with the State Historical Society of North Dakota and with funding from the North Dakota Humanities Council. See all the Dakota Datebooks at prairiepublic.org, or subscribe to the “Dakota Datebook” podcast.