- physdesc
-
{"format"=>"structured", "physdesc_components"=>[{"name"=>"extent", "value"=>"19 linear feet", "unit"=>"linear feet"}, {"name"=>"extent", "value"=>"26 boxes", "unit"=>"containers"}], "supress_display"=>true}
- unitid
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{"value"=>"*T-Mss 1985-006", "type"=>"local_call"}
{"value"=>"21844", "type"=>"local_mss"}
- unitdate
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{"value"=>"1912-1985", "type"=>"inclusive"}
{"value"=>"dates, 1927-1972", "type"=>"bulk"}
- unittitle
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{"value"=>"Nancy Hamilton papers"}
- repository
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{"value"=>"<span class=\"corpname\">The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts.</span> <span class=\"subarea\">Billy Rose Theatre Division.</span> <div class=\"address\"><span class=\"addressline\">New York, New York</span></div>"}
- abstract
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{"value"=>"Nancy Hamilton was an American actress, playwright, lyricist, director and producer. She worked in the New York theater from 1932-1954. This collection includes personal files, scripts, production materials, scores, photographs and scrapbooks."}
- prefercite
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{"value"=>"<p> Nancy Hamilton Papers, *T-Mss 1985-006, Billy Rose Theatre Division, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts.</p>"}
- origination
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{"value"=>"Hamilton, Nancy", "type"=>"persname"}
- bioghist
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{"value"=>"<p>Nancy Hamilton was born in Sewickley, Pennsylvania on July 27, 1908, where she attended Miss Dickinson’s School. She also studied at the Sorbonne in Paris from 1926-1927 and received a Bachelor of Arts from Smith College in 1930, where she appeared in and directed plays. She started her theatrical career writing, producing and acting in the revue, <span class=\"title\">And So On</span> in 1930. In the early 1930s she concentrated on her writing career and her articles and poems appeared in various newspapers and magazines.</p> <p>In 1932 she made her Broadway debut in <span class=\"title\">The Warrior’s Husband</span>, playing a small role and understudying the leading lady, Katharine Hepburn. In 1934 she wrote songs for and appeared in the first <span class=\"title\">New Faces</span> revue. In 1935 she played Miss Bingley in Helen Jerome’s dramatization of Jane Austen’s <span class=\"title\">Pride and Prejudice</span>. In the mid-30s she wrote special material for the comedienne Beatrice Lillie that was performed on the radio. With playwrights James Shute and Rosemary Casey and composer Frederick Loewe Hamilton worked on a musical called <span class=\"title\">Return Engagement</span> that was never produced but was later adapted by MGM into a vehicle for Carole Lombard, <span class=\"title\">Fools for Scandal</span> (1938).</p> <p>In collaboration with composer Morgan Lewis, Hamilton wrote lyrics and comic sketches for the popular revue, <span class=\"title\">One for the Money</span> (1939). Hamilton was also a member of the cast, which also featured Alfred Drake, Brenda Forbes, Gene Kelly and Keenan Wynn. Lewis and Hamilton followed <span class=\"title\">One for the Money</span> with the equally successful <span class=\"title\">Two for the Show</span> (1940), which also starred Drake, Forbes and Wynn as well as Eve Arden, Richard Haydn and Betty Hutton. <span class=\"title\">Two for the Show</span> also introduced the song “How High the Moon” which has become a jazz standard, covered by such musicians and singers as Benny Goodman, Gene Krupa, Harry James, June Christy, Les Paul and Mary Ford, Ella Fitzgerald, Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, Nat King Cole and Gloria Gaynor.</p> <p>In the 1930s Hamilton met the great stage actress Katharine Cornell and the two soon became lifelong friends. During WWII, Hamilton wrote the scripts for Billie Burke’s radio show, <span class=\"title\">Fashions in Rations</span>. From 1944-1945 Hamilton was an assistant stage manager and understudy in Cornell’s wartime company, performing <span class=\"title\">The Barretts of Wimpole Street</span> for servicemen in hospitals in Europe. After the war she and Morgan Lewis completed the third in their series, <span class=\"title\">Three to Make Ready</span>, which featured Ray Bolger, Brenda Forbes, Harold Lang and Gordon MacRae. Hamilton and Lewis’ trio of revues were combined into later revues, including <span class=\"title\">Three to One</span> (1952), <span class=\"title\">Here We Go</span>, which was proposed for television in the 1950s and <span class=\"title\">One for the Money, etc.</span> that was produced Off-Broadway in 1972. In the late 1940s Hamilton worked with Helen Hockinson on the never produced play, <span class=\"title\">Our Best Girl</span>, and she and Lewis wrote a musical, <span class=\"title\">Maggie Here</span> that was also not produced.</p> <p>In 1954 Hamilton and Lewis contributed a song to the Mary Martin vehicle <span class=\"title\">Peter Pan</span>, the score of which was primarily written by two other song-writing teams, Moose Charlap and Carolyn Leigh; and Jule Styne and Betty Comden and Adolph Green. Hamilton produced directed and co-wrote with James Shute, a documentary about Helen Keller, <span class=\"title\">The Unconquered</span> (1954), for which she won an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature. From 1959-1960, Hamilton accompanied Cornell on the national tour of <span class=\"title\">Dear Liar</span>. After Cornell’s retirement, she and Hamilton lived on Martha’s Vineyard, which was the subject of their 1971 documentary film, <span class=\"title\">This is Our Island</span>.</p> <p>In 1971, “How High the Moon” was included in The Songwriters’ Hall of Fame. Nancy Hamilton died in New York, NY on February 18, 1985.</p>"}
- scopecontent
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{"value"=>"<p> The Nancy Hamilton Papers consists of personal and professional files of the actress, playwright, lyricist, director and producer Nancy Hamilton. The papers include material from as early as 1912 and as late and 1985, but the bulk of the material is between 1927 and 1972. This collection contains personal items, such as business files, clippings, correspondence, photographs and writings by Hamilton. It also contains professional files pertaining to the stage productions she wrote or appeared in, such as <span class=\"title\">Maggie Here</span>, <span class=\"title\">Mary Poppins</span>, <span class=\"title\">New Faces</span> (1934), <span class=\"title\">One for the Money</span> (1939), <span class=\"title\">Our Best Girl</span>, <span class=\"title\">Peter Pan</span> (1954), <span class=\"title\">Pride and Prejudice</span> (1935), <span class=\"title\">Three to Make Ready</span> (1946) and <span class=\"title\">Two for the Show</span> (1940), the radio program, <span class=\"title\">Fashions in Rations</span> (1943-1944) and the documentary film, <span class=\"title\">The Unconquered</span> (1954). This collection contains scores, photographs scrapbooks and production materials, including contracts, correspondence, scripts, programs and publicity materials pertaining to these works.</p>"}
{"value"=>"<p class='list-head'>The Nancy Hamilton papers are arranged in five series:</p>\n<ul class='arrangement series-descriptions'>\n<li><div class='series-title'><a href='/the/21844#c527894'>Series I: Personal Files</a></div>\n<div class='series-date'>1927-1985</div>\n<div class='series-extent'>3 boxes</div>\n<div class='series-description'><p>This series contains personal items, such as artwork, awards, biographical materials, business files, clippings, correspondence, identification cards, notebooks and wills. Also included are writings by Hamilton, such as articles, poems and stories as well as sketches and lyrics, which were not written for a particular production.</p></div></li><li><div class='series-title'><a href='/the/21844#c527972'>Series II: Production Files</a></div>\n<div class='series-date'>1912-1977</div>\n<div class='series-extent'>16 boxes</div>\n<div class='series-description'><p>This series contains production materials for works that featured Hamilton or included material written by her. This series contains materials her film, television and radio projects, most notably the wartime radio program, <span class=\"title\">Fashions in Rations</span> that starred Billie Burke. Most of this series pertains to stage productions, including the series of revues she wrote with composer Morgan Lewis, <span class=\"title\">One for the Money</span> (1939), <span class=\"title\">Two for the Show</span> (1940) and <span class=\"title\">Three to Make Ready</span> (1946). Shows she contributed material to, including <span class=\"title\">New Faces</span> (1934) and <span class=\"title\">Peter Pan</span> (1954), as well as unproduced projects such as <span class=\"title\">Maggie Here</span>, <span class=\"title\">Mary Poppins</span> and <span class=\"title\">Our Best Girl</span> are also documented. Materials in this series are cast lists, background research materials, contracts, correspondence, scripts, programs and publicity materials.</p></div></li><li><div class='series-title'><a href='/the/21844#c528213'>Series III: Scores</a></div>\n<div class='series-date'>1931-1950</div>\n<div class='series-extent'>4 boxes</div>\n<div class='series-description'><p>This series contains scores for shows with lyrics by Nancy Hamilton, such as <span class=\"title\">Maggie Here</span>, <span class=\"title\">Mary Poppins</span>, <span class=\"title\">One for the Money</span>, <span class=\"title\">Our Best Girl</span>, <span class=\"title\">Two for the Show</span> and <span class=\"title\">Three to Make Ready</span> and for individual songs by Hamilton. This series also includes a score for the Helen Keller documentary <span class=\"title\">The Unconquered</span> (1954), scripted, directed and produced by Hamilton with a score by her frequent collaborator, Morgan Lewis.</p><p>All scores are unpublished piano/vocal, unless noted.</p></div></li><li><div class='series-title'><a href='/the/21844#c528325'>Series IV: Photographs</a></div>\n<div class='series-date'>1914-1972</div>\n<div class='series-extent'>2 boxes</div>\n<div class='series-description'><p>This series contains both candid and posed portraits of Hamilton and various friends and colleagues. Also included are production shots of shows with material written by Hamilton, or in which she performed, including <span class=\"title\">New Faces</span>, <span class=\"title\">One for the Money</span>, <span class=\"title\">Pride and Prejudice</span> (1935), <span class=\"title\">Three to Make Ready</span> and <span class=\"title\">Two for the Show.</span></p></div></li><li><div class='series-title'><a href='/the/21844#c528350'>Series V: Scrapbooks, 1939-1940</a></div>\n<div class='series-extent'>1 box</div>\n<div class='series-description'><p>This series contains one scrapbook of clippings and other publicity materials pertaining to <span class=\"title\">One for the Money</span> and <span class=\"title\">Two for the Show</span>.</p></div></li></ul>\n", "type"=>"arrangement"}
- arrangement
-
{"value"=>"<p> <ul> <li>Series I: Personal Files, 1927-1985</li> <li>Series II: Production Files, 1912-1977</li> <li>Series III: Scores, 1931-1950</li> <li>Series IV: Photographs, 1914-1972</li> <li>Series V: Scrapbooks, 1939-1940</li></ul></p>", "supress_display"=>true}
- acqinfo
-
{"value"=>"<p> The Nancy Hamilton Papers were donated to the Billy Rose Theatre Division in 1985 by Nancy Hamilton.</p>"}
- userestrict
-
{"value"=>"<p>For permission to publish, contact the Curator, Billy Rose Theatre Division.</p>"}
- relatedmaterial
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{"value"=>"<p> Other material pertaining to Nancy Hamilton can be found in the collection John Gielgud Correspondence to Katharine Cornell, Guthrie McClintic and Nancy Hamilton, 1958-1982, *T-Mss 1990-008 and the Katharine Cornell Papers, *T-Mss 1965-002.</p>"}
- date_inclusive_start
-
1912
- date_inclusive_end
-
1985
- keydate
-
1912
- processinfo
-
{"value"=>"<p>Processed by Diana Bertolini; Machine-readable finding aid created by Diana Bertolini.</p>"}
- extent_statement
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19 linear feet (26 boxes)