Volume 12 , Issue 14

Rollie Lynn Riggs (1899-1954)

Perhaps some of you Okie's around Claremore, Oklahoma might remember this famous author, poet and playwright, Rollie Lynn Riggs, born August 31, 1899 ? died June 30, 1954, who was born on a farm near Claremore, Oklahoma. You might remember Riggs for his play, Green Grow the Lilacs. (Do lilacs really grow green, though?)

Lynn Riggs mother was 1/8th Cherokee, and when Lynn was two years old, his mother secured his Cherokee Allotment for him. Riggs was able to draw on his Allotment to help support his writing. Riggs wrote 21 full-length plays, several short stories, poems, and a television script.

Lynn Riggs was educated at the Eastern University Preparatory School in Claremore, Oklahoma, starting in 1912. Riggs graduated from high school in 1917, and travelled to Chicago and New York. He worked for the Adams Express Company in Chicago, wrote for the Wall Street Journal, sold books at Macy's and swept out Wall Street offices. Returning to Oklahoma in 1919, he wrote for the Oil and Gas Journal.

Travelling to Los Angeles, Riggs worked as an extra in the theatre, and a copyeditor at the Los Angeles Times, which published his first poem. Riggs entered the University of Oklahoma in 1920, and taught English there from 1922-1923. However, Riggs did not graduate after he became ill with tuberculosis during his senior year.

Riggs then moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico for health reasons and soon joined a group of artists. However, in 1926 Riggs moved back to New York hoping to work in the Broadway theatres.

His first major production was a one-act play, Knives from Syria, which was produced by the Santa Fe Players in 1925. He began teaching at the Lewis Institute, Chicago, while continuing to write. In 1928 he received a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship and travelled to Europe.

Riggs began writing his most famous play, "Green Grow the Lilacs" in the Cafe De Deux Magots on the Left Bank in Paris. He completed this play five months later in Cagnes-sur-Mer, in Southern France.

He then lived in Santa Fe, Los Angeles, and New York, and was a screenwriter for Paramount and Universal Studios. After serving in the military 1942-44 he worked on an historical drama for Western Reserve University, published a short story, Eben, The Hound, and the Hare (1952), and worked on a novel set in Oklahoma.

He moved to Shelter Island, New York after he started receiving a steady income when Green Grow The Lilacs was adapted into the landmark musical Oklahoma! in 1943.

He died on June 30, 1954, of stomach cancer in New York City. Claremore, Oklahoma is home to the Lynn Riggs Memorial. Rollie Lynn Riggs - American Playwright>
  |  View or Add Comments (0 Comments)   |   Receive updates ( subscribers)  |   Unsubscribe

---