GOTHAM PLAYWRIGHT SCORES CORPORATION

Pronouncing Professor George Pierce Baker '87, head of the 47 Workshop, a "prophet who is without honor in his own country" and otherwise scoring the University authorities for their laxness in providing Professor Baker with adequate equipment for carrying on his teaching, Hermann Hagedorn '07, prominent New York playwright and author, yesterday addressed a vigorous letter to the CRIMSON decrying the situation which he described as "incredible" and commending the paper heartily for its editorial of last Friday entitled "George Pierce Baker".

Need Felt 20 Years Ago

Mr. Hagedorn, after recalling that the need for a drama building at the University was felt even 20 years ago, makes the statement that Professor Baker "has offered to raise the money himself, but the authorities at Harvard, evidently believing that such an effort on his part might divert funds which they desired to secure for other purposes, barred every effort."

Is Famous Author and Poet

Mr. Hermann Hagedorn, the author of the letter, is a member of The Players Club of New York, has had several plays produced both in New York and in Cambridge by the Dramatic Club, and is the writer of numerous well-known poems. He is the author of "Theodore Roosevelt" and of "Roosevelt in The Bad Lands". He is a trustee of the Roosevelt Memorial Association and is a member of the American Association of Arts and Letters.

Mr. Hagedorn's letter follows in full "Editor, The Harvard CRIMSON, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

"Dear Sir:

"All Harvard men interested in the future of American drama will endorse your editorial reproving the University authorities for their lassitude in supporting Professor Baker in the magnificent work which he has been doing at Harvard for thirty years for the advancement of the American stage. It appears to be another case of the prophet who is without honor in his own country and among his own people. All over the country for years the eyes of ambitious young men and women, who have sought expression through the drama, have turned to Professor Baker for inspiration and instruction. They have come from near and far to take his courses and to write and produce plays under his supervision. Some of them have come from other universities and have been astonished to find that the physical equipment they found at the end of their pilgrimage was insignificant beside the physical equipment that their own universities offered in the same field. They found that the great teacher, whose name was familiar in every American university, had practically no real physical equipment at all at his disposal. They saw him accept, with as good grace as possible, dingy rooms here or there which the corporation appeared to have no other use for, first in Dane Hall, then in Massachusetts Hall. When the corporation decided that it needed Massachusetts for other purposes. It apparently made no provision at all for quarters for Mr. Baker's dramatic laboratory.

"Twenty years ago, when I was a; Harvard. I remember Professor baker expressing the urgent need of a drama building, with adequate provision for producing plays, painting scenery, ex perimenting with lighting, etc. Ever since, he has been pleading for such a building, and pleading in vain. I know that he has offered to raise the money himself, but the authorities at Harvard, evidently believing that such an effort on his part might divert funds which they desired to secure for other purposes, barred every effort. Other universities have offered him everything that he wanted in the way of equipment if he would only come to them. He refused, as you said in your editorial, out of sheer loyalty to Harvard, hoping against hope that he might be enabled to bring to fruition at Harvard the work which he had developed there from small beginnings.

"Professor Baker has been a pioneer in the field of dramatic teaching. All over the country, in every field of dramatic production, men who have felt his influence are working today bringing American drama to a higher level than it has ever reached before. It seems incredible that, when all the reward that such a man asks is to be given equipment so that he may do better work, that equipment should be withheld from him.  "Hermann Hagedorn (1907).