Mary Eleanor Fitzgerald (March 16, 1877 – March 30, 1955) was an American editor and theatre professional, best known for her association with Emma Goldman and

Alexander Berkman Alexander Berkman (November 21, 1870June 28, 1936) was a Russian-American anarchist and author. He was a leading member of the anarchist movement in the early 20th century, famous for both his political activism and his writing. Be ...

, and with the

Provincetown Players The Provincetown Players was a collective of artists, writers, intellectuals, and amateur theater enthusiasts. Under the leadership of the husband and wife team of George Cram “Jig” Cook and Susan Glaspell from Iowa, the Players produced two ...

Early life and education

Mary Eleanor "Fitzi" Fitzgerald was born in

Deerfield, Wisconsin Deerfield is a village in Dane County, Wisconsin. The population was 2,319 at the time of the 2010 census. The village is located within the Town of Deerfield. It is part of the Madison Metropolitan Statistical Area. Towns and villages near Dee ...

and raised in

Hancock, Wisconsin Hancock is a village in Waushara County, Wisconsin, Waushara County, Wisconsin, United States. The population was 417 at the 2010 United States Census, 2010 census. The village is located within the Hancock (town), Wisconsin, Town of Hancock. Geog ...

, the daughter of James and Ada Fitzgerald. She became a teacher at age 16, and planned to be a missionary before leaving the Seventh-day Adventist Church. She worked as a bookkeeper and as a booker and publicist at a speaker agency in Kansas City, Missouri in her twenties.

Career

Fitzgerald moved from

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

with

Ben Reitman __NOTOC__ Ben Lewis Reitman M.D. (1879–1943) was an American anarchist and physician to the poor ("the hobo doctor"). He is best remembered today as one of radical Emma Goldman's lovers. Reitman was a flamboyant, eccentric character. Emma Goldm ...

in 1913; the two lived with Emma Goldman. Fitzgerald became assistant editor of '' Mother Earth'' alongside Goldman. In 1914 she was part of the Union Square rallies against unemployment. She was also a member of Heterodoxy during this time. In 1915 she moved to

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...

with Alexander Berkman, and edited '' The Blast'' with him. When Goldman and Berkman were arrested in 1917, it was Fitzgerald who raised their bail. She helped to found the Political Prisoners Amnesty League, and was briefly charged with conspiracy in the events surrounding the Mooney-Billings convictions. She moved into theatrical work in 1918, through her acquaintance with Emma Goldman's niece and fellow Heterodoxy member Stella Cominsky Ballantine. During the 1920s she served in various roles with the

, including as executive director. Agnes Boulton recalled, " itzgeraldstayed with the Provincetown Players, giving them everything she had--her health, her time, her warm devotion, her life--up to the very end." Theatre historian Stella Hanau remarked, "They were so closely bound together that Fitzi without the Provincetown would have been a different person, and the Provincetown without Fitzi cannot be imagined." Later Fitzgerald worked with the

Dramatic Workshop Dramatic Workshop was the name of a drama and acting school associated with the New School for Social Research in New York City. It was launched in 1940 by German expatriate stage director Erwin Piscator. Among the faculty were Lee Strasberg and Ste ...

at the New School for Social Research, and with other productions in New York City.

Personal life

Fitzgerald was a tall woman, with striking red hair. She had romantic relationships with Ben Reitman and Alexander Berkman during her decade of political activism, and had a passionate but brief relationship with opera singer Mischa-Leon before his sudden death in 1924. She lived with fellow activist Pauline Turkel for many years, in

Greenwich Village Greenwich Village ( , , ) is a neighborhood on the west side of Lower Manhattan in New York City, bounded by 14th Street to the north, Broadway to the east, Houston Street to the south, and the Hudson River to the west. Greenwich Village ...

and later in Sherman, Connecticut, where Turkel and Fitzgerald hosted Hart Crane and

Djuna Barnes Djuna Barnes (, June 12, 1892 – June 18, 1982) was an American artist, illustrator, journalist, and writer who is perhaps best known for her novel ''Nightwood'' (1936), a cult classic of lesbian fiction and an important work of modernist liter ...

among their many guests. Eleanor Fitzgerald died from cancer in spring 1955, in Hancock, Wisconsin, at the age of 78. Her papers are at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.M. Eleanor Fitzgerald Papers, 1915-1974, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, UWM Libraries.
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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Fitzgerald, Eleanor American editors American anarchists People from Deerfield, Wisconsin People from Hancock, Wisconsin 1877 births 1955 deaths People from Sherman, Connecticut