# The Greenwich Village Bookshop Door

The Greenwich Village Bookshop Door (1920–25) separated the back office from the main area of Frank Shay's Bookshop in Greenwich Village from 1920 until 1925, where it served as an autograph book for nearly two hundred and fifty authors, artists, publishers, poets, and Bohemian creatives. Notable signatories include Upton Sinclair, the Provincetown Players, John Sloan, Susan Glaspell, Theodore Dreiser, Porter Garnett, and Sinclair Lewis. The door has been held in the permanent collections of the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin since it was purchased in 1960.

## History

The bookshop door began its provenance at 11 Christopher Street in Greenwich Village, in the home of novelist and playwright Floyd Dell. The building was slated for demolition in 1920 when the owner of the bookshop across the street, Frank Shay, spotted the then-bright red door and salvaged it for his office. Much is yet unknown about The Greenwich Village Bookshop Door, including why individuals were chosen to sign it, which way the door originally faced, when exactly the signatures began and ended, or even when it was painted blue.
   "It is true that Greenwich Village is an anomaly. To the pseudo-artist it is a Sargasso Sea, a cess-pool of lost effort and alluring but unkept promises. To the sincere student of art or literature it is America's greatest proving ground...in all this great United States it is the only place a person can sport a stocking with a hole in the heel, and an idea. Elsewhere both are taboo."

### Frank Shay's Bookshop

Frank Shay opened his bookshop in October 1920 at 4 Christopher Street, in what had previously been the Columbia Cafe where John Masefield briefly worked as a bar-back in the mid-1890s. Another portion of the building functioned as an art studio owned by Winold Reiss until 1921, when Shay obtained the space and effectively doubled the size of his bookshop.
Until the door was rescued from Floyd Dell's old apartment, Frank Shay's office was separated from the rest of his bookshop by a thin sheet that hung in the doorway. Though Shay himself never admitted it, authors William McFee and Christopher Morley would eventually both write that Frank had taken the door for more privacy as several customers and friends had seen the silhouette of him drinking in his office after the prohibition had outlawed such activity.
The signatures began on the door before Shay even had the chance to repaint it, resulting in the large unpainted areas that remain on the door today. According to Christopher Morley, author Hendrik Willem van Loon was the first to sign the door; doing so spontaneously and accompanying his name with a doodle of a sailing ship. The earliest dated signatures, those of John Van Alstyne Weaver and Porter Garnett, were added on October 17, 1921.
Frank cultivated a creative environment in his bookshop that encouraged publishers, writers, artists, theater directors, actors, cartoonists, illustrators, political activists and more to socialize and gather at his shop. Shay went beyond selling books, going so far as to edit plays for other publishing houses, lecture on the importance of books and bookselling, create a circulating library, and put a great deal of effort into his award-winning window displays. In 1921, inspired by his friend Christopher Morley's 1917 novel Parnassus on Wheels, Shay modified a Ford truck for the purpose of mobile book selling.
Frank Shay's Bookshop shelves were lined with popular novels, children's books, socialist pamphlets and avant-garde chapbooks. He placed a particular emphasis on carrying the books of Walt Whitman and Joseph Conrad. Many early 20th-century booksellers expanded their businesses by adding publishing services and Frank Shay was no exception. The bookshop published a poetry magazine titled The Measure, the Salvo series of chapbooks, a local newspaper titled The Greenwich Villager, and numerous books and booklets of poetry, prose, and plays. The bookshop even printed their own set of branded stationery and envelopes.
Frank Shay sold his bookshop sometime during the summer of 1924, after his wife (Fern Forrester Shay) gave birth to their daughter Jean. The family moved to Provincetown, Massachusetts shortly after, opening a new bookshop in the Cape Cod area under the same name as the original. The bookshop in New York City appeared as "The Greenwich Village Bookshop" several times before closing permanently approximately a year later. While delivering a lecture at the University of Pennsylvania in 1931, author Christopher Morley said "It was too personal, too enchanting, too Bohemian a bookshop to survive indefinitely, but for five or six years it played a very real part in the creative life of New York City."
The original building that housed Frank Shay's Bookshop at 4 Christopher Street was demolished and replaced by a modern building sometime around 1960, less than a decade before the creation of the Greenwich Village Historic District would have protected it from destruction.

### After the bookshop

Creditors acquired the full inventory and contents of the shop sometime during August 1925, as financial circumstances caused the bookshop to close. Shop manager Juliette Koenig noticed that the repossession crew had ignored the door, so she took it off of its hinges and enlisted several writers to bring it back to her apartment. Finding it interesting enough to protect with varnish and store in her house for more than three decades, Juliette Koenig Smith eventually sold the door to the University of Texas at Austin through an art dealer in 1960. At this time the door was accompanied by a list of approximately 25 identified signatures and a letter from Christopher Morley that thanked Juliette for rescuing the door. The original advertisement published in the Saturday Review read:
   "Mrs. Frank Leon Smith has a door for sale. On the door are the autographs of about sixty people who in the early Twenties were important, famous, talented, unusual. I'm telling you, this is a fabulous door....Want a door? Ask Mrs. Smith at 321 East 52nd Street, New York 22."
The Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin responded to the advertisement and purchased the door, subsequently allowing it to remain undisturbed in their collections for over a decade until a graduate student named Anna Lou Ashby discovered it in storage in 1972. While completing the first official research on the door, Ashby was able to identify 25 more signatures including those of Egmont Arens, Albert Boni, Robert Nathan, and Max Liebermann. After Ashby's brief research the door was again returned to storage where it remained for several more decades. The bookshop door was rediscovered again in 2008 and research was quickly organized by Molly Schwartzburg, a curator of literature at the University of Texas at Austin.

### The Greenwich Village Bookshop Door: A Portal to Bohemia, 1920–1925

The Harry Ransom Center mounted The Greenwich Village Bookshop Door: A Portal to Bohemia, 1920–1925 exhibition from September 6, 2011, until January 22, 2012. The exhibition marked the first and thus far only public show to include the bookshop door, with curation headed by Molly Schwartzburg. For the duration of the exhibition The Greenwich Village Bookshop Door was installed in the middle of a gallery, on a custom blue base that exactly matched the color of the door. It was encased in plexiglas and anchored to the ceiling with steel wires for added security.
Historians at the Harry Ransom Center were able to use online photograph databases and collections in 2010 to prepare for the exhibition, relying on technology that was not available when the university first acquired the door in 1960. Curators educated themselves on twentieth-century penmanship techniques to correctly match signatures on the door to those found on original manuscripts, novels, poems, letters, drawings and more. Their diligence resulted in the identification of more than one hundred and fifty additional signatures.
The physical exhibition ran concurrently with a more in-depth online, virtual exhibit that was still accessible as of 2022. This online exhibit allowed viewers to learn more about each of the identified signatories and their connections to one another. The Harry Ransom Center continues to operate a website highlighting the door's yet unidentified signatures in hopes of using the public's assistance to eventually identify every signature on the door.
In 2012, the Harry Ransom Center was nominated for an Austin Critics' Table award for "Best Museum Exhibition" for their work on The Greenwich Valley Bookshop Door: A Portal to Bohemia exhibition. The Austin Critics' Table awards are a series of longstanding Austin awards that seek to honor those involved in all aspects of the local art scene.

## Signatures

Approximately 25 autographs had been identified and connected to their respective owners by the time the University of Texas obtained the door in 1960. As of 2021, only 47 of the 242 total signatures remained unidentified. Two individuals, Laurie York Erskine and Don Marquis, signed the door on two separate occasions, and a handful of signatures are from fictional characters. During research for the 2011 exhibition historians separated the known signatures into five major groups: writing, publishing, visual arts, performance, and social groups. Many names are featured in more than one category, as day jobs overlapped with hobbies and social groups that all intersected at Frank Shay's Bookshop.
A wide selection of those involved in the 1920s literary scene in New York City and beyond signed The Greenwich Village Bookshop Door. Many worked as publishers, librarians, booksellers, and both magazine and book editors. Signatures included in the writing category consist of those of poets, historians, translators, critics, fiction and travel writers, playwrights, humorists, journalists, and screenwriters. Many of the individuals in this category had their writings censored by the New York Society for the Suppression of Vice, an organization that claimed to supervise public morality.
The performance category of signatures includes theater directors, stage actors, those employed in the early film industry, and members of theater troupes like the Provincetown Players and the Washington Square Players. Visual artists who signed The Greenwich Village Bookshop Door included architects, sculptors, cartoonists, photographers, industrial designers, illustrators, typographers and more. Both the Art Students League and the 1913 Armory Show are represented by a handful of signatures.
At least one member of the following social groups signed The Greenwich Village Bookshop Door: Skull and Bones, Three Hours for Lunch Club, Algonquin Round Table, and the Bohemian Club. Several politicians, teachers, seafarers, and Greenwich Village business owners also signed the door. Additionally, thirty-two signatures have been identified as belonging to men who served as soldiers or war correspondents in World War I.
Known signatures on The Greenwich Village Bookshop Door :
| Name | Category | Occupation(s) | Affiliation(s) | Notable Work/ Publication(s) |
| Franklin Abbott | Visual arts | Architect, illustrator | Three Hours for Lunch Club | |
| Achmed Abdullah | Writing | Screenwriter, translator, fiction writer | World War I veteran | Chang: A Drama of the Wilderness (1927) |
| Mary Aldis | Performance, visual arts | Playwright, poet, stage actor | Little Theater Movement, little magazines | |
| George William Armis | Publishing | Bookseller | | |
| Sherwood Anderson | Writing | Critic, novelist, poet, playwright | Little magazines | The Masses, Marching Men (1917), Horses and Men (1923) |
| Egmont Arens | Publishing, visual arts | Publisher, editor, industrial designer | Provincetown Players, little magazines | KitchenAid Mixer (designer) |
| Mary Austin | Writing | Travel writer, playwright, teacher | Little Theater Movement | |
| Eugene S. Bagger | Writing | Translator, historian, journalist | | |
| Bardar (Samuel bar Hammurabi Yaqub) | Writing | Poet, editor, typesetter | | |
| Winslow M. Bell | Publishing | Bookseller | Greenwich Village businesses, World War I veteran | |
| William Rose Benet | Visual arts, writing | Artist, editor, poet, translator, seafarer | Three Hours for Lunch Club, World War I veteran | Pulitzer Prize for Poetry (1942) |
| Florence Blackstone | Social groups | | Women's suffrage | |
| Paul J. Blackstone | | | | |
| David William Bone | Writing | Fiction and travel writer, seafarer | Three Hours for Lunch Club, World War I veteran (UK) | |
| Albert Boni | Publishing | Bookseller, editor, publisher | Greenwich Village businesses, Little Theater Movement, Washington Square Players, socialism | Boni & Liveright |
| Charles Boni | Publishing | Bookseller, editor, publisher | Greenwich Village businesses, Little Theater Movement, Washington Square Players | |
| Ernest Augustus Boyd | Publishing | Critic, editor, translator | | Saturday Review of Literature |
| Will H. Bradley | Visual arts | Film director, illustrator | | |
| Berton Braley | Writing | Poet, fiction writer, editor | | |
| Max M. Breslow | Publishing | Bookseller | | |
| Heywood Broun | Social groups | Journalist, politician | Algonquin Round Table, socialism | The NewsGuild-CWA (founder) |
| Albert Brush | Performance | Stage actor, poet | Provincetown Players | |
| Arthur Caesar | Writing | Journalist, playwright, screenwriter | World War I veteran | His Darker Self (1924), Manhattan Melodrama (1934) |
| Henry Seidel Canby | Writing | Critic, editor, professor | Three Hours for Lunch Club | Saturday Review of Literature |
| Jonathan Cape | Publishing | Publisher | World War I veteran | Jonathan Cape |
| Gene Carr | Visual arts | Cartoonist, illustrator | Little magazines | New York Herald, New York World, New York Evening Journal |
| Oscar Edward Cesare | Visual arts | Cartoonist, journalist | Armory Show of 1913 | The Masses |
| Christine Challenger | Visual arts | Illustrator | | |
| Betty Ross Clarke | Performance | Stage actor, screen actor | | If I were King (1920 film), Traveling Salesman (1921 film) |
| Helen Louise Cohen | Writing | Critic, editor, teacher | | |
| Alta May Coleman | Writing | Journalist, critic | | |
| Seward Collins | Publishing | Bookseller, publisher | | |
| Frank Conroy | Performance | Stage actor, screen actor, theater director | Little Theater Movement, Washington Square Players | Grand Hotel (1932 film), The Little Minister (1934 film) |
| George Cram Cook | Performance | Stage actor, playwright, teacher, theater director | Little Theater Movement, Provincetown Players, socialism | |
| John Cournos | Writing | Fiction writer, poet, translator | | The Philadelphia Record |
| Bosworth Crocker | Writing | Playwright | Provincetown Players, Washington Square Players | |
| J. Vincent Crowne | Writing | Professor, essayist | | |
| Homer Croy | Writing | Fiction writer, humorist, screenwriter | Three Hours for Lunch Club | West of the Water Tower (1923) |
| Mary Carolyn Davies | Writing | Poet, playwright | Little Theater Movement, Provincetown Players, Bohemian Club | The Youth's Companion, The Masses |
| Helena Smith-Dayton | Visual arts | Illustrator, sculptor, stop-motion animator | Society of Illustrators | |
| Fred Erving Dayton | Publishing, writing | Journalist, playwright, publisher | | |
| Floyd Dell | Writing | Critic, fiction writer, journalist | Provincetown Players, little magazines, socialism | The Masses |
| Sam DeWit | Social groups, writing | Politician, poet, writer | Little magazines, socialism | |
| Roy Dickinson | Publishing, writing | Critic, journalist, editor, publisher | World War I veteran | Printers' Ink |
| Charles Divine | Writing | Journalist, poet, playwright, teacher | World War I veteran | |
| Alice Willits Donaldson | Visual arts | Artist, illustrator | | |
| John Dos Passos | Writing | Critic, editor, fiction writer | Little magazines, socialism, World War I veteran | The Masses, Three Soldiers (1921), Manhattan Transfer (1925) |
| Theodore Dreiser | Writing | Playwright | Provincetown Players, socialism | Sister Carrie (1900), An American Tragedy (1925) |
| Joseph Drum | Writing | Fiction writer, playwright | | |
| Robert L. Eaton | | | | |
| Laurie York Erskine | Writing | Novelist, educator | World War I veteran (UK) | Solebury School (founder) |
| Winifred Eward | Writing | Fiction and travel writer | World War I veteran | |
| Henry Guy Fangel | Visual arts | Illustrator, photographer | | Good Housekeeping |
| John Chipman Farrar | Publishing | Editor, publisher, teacher | Skull and Bones, World War I veteran | The Bookman; Farrar, Straus and Giroux (founder) |
| Hugh Ferriss | Visual arts | Architect, industrial designer, writer | | Liberty Memorial, Tribune Tower, The Metropolis of Tomorrow (1929) |
| Arthur Davison Ficke | Writing | Poet | World War I veteran | |
| John Bernard Flannagan | Visual arts | Cartoonist, sculptor, seafarer | Guggenheim Fellowship | The Masses |
| Dwight Franklin | Visual arts | Sculptor, set designer | | Treasure Island (1934 film), Buccaneer (1938 film) |
| James Earle Fraser | Visual arts | Sculptor, teacher | Armory Show of 1913, Art Students League | Buffalo nickel, Equestrian Statue of Theodore Roosevelt (1939) |
| Joseph Lewis French | Writing | Poet | | |
| Robert Frothingham | Writing | Anthologist, journalist, travel writer | | |
| Barney Gallant | Publishing | Bookseller, restaurateur | Greenwich Village businesses | |
| Porter Garnett | Publishing | Editor, librarian, playwright, professor | Bohemian Club, Little Theater Movement | |
| Susan Glaspell | Performance | Playwright, stage actor | Little Theater Movement, Provincetown Players, socialism, Washington Square Players | Alison's House (1930), Pulitzer Prize for Drama (1931), Trifles (1917) |
| Montague Glass | Writing | Humorist, playwright | | |
| Joseph Gollomb | Writing | Journalist, teacher | Socialism | |
| Herbert S. Gorman | Writing | Biographer, editor, journalist | | New York Post, The New York Times |
| Stephen Graham | Writing | Travel Writer | Tramping | Harper's Magazine, The New Yorker |
| Dorothy L.A. Grant | Publishing | Bookseller | | |
| Harry Wagstaff Gribble | Writing | Playwright, screenwriter | | A Bill of Divorcement (1932 film), All Gummed Up (1947) |
| William Gropper | Visual arts | Cartoonist | Armory Show of 1913, socialism | The Bookman, The Masses |
| Louise Closser Hale | Performance | Screen and stage actor, writer | | Arizona (1900), The Hole in The Wall (1929) |
| Harry Hansen | Writing | Historian, journalist | World War I reporter | Chicago Daily News, New York World |
| Sadakichi Hartmann | Writing | Actor, editor, poet, writer | | |
| Josephine Herbst | Writing | Journalist, writer | Little magazines, socialism | Pity is Not Enough (1933) |
| John Hermann | Writing | Fiction writer | Socialism | Scribner's Magazine |
| W.E. Hill | Visual arts | Cartoonist, illustrator | | This Side of Paradise (1920) |
| Elisabeth Sanxay Holding | Writing | Novelist | | |
| Robert Cortes Holliday | Publishing, writing | Bookseller, critic, editor, writer | Art Students League, little magazines | The Bookman, New York Tribune |
| Terence Holliday | Publishing | Bookseller, critic | | |
| Guy Holt | Publishing | Editor, publisher | | |
| Holland Hudson | Performance | Playwright, stage actor | Little Theater Movement, Washington Square Players | |
| Peter Lord Templeton Hunt | Visual arts | Artist | World War I veteran | |
| Frank Townsend Hutchens | Visual arts | Illustrator | Art Students League | |
| Lewis Jackson | | | | |
| Norman Jacobsen | Visual arts | Cartoonist, illustrator | Little theater movement, Provincetown Players | The Masses |
| Rutger Bleecker Jewett | Publishing | Editor, publisher | | The Masses |
| Orrick Glenday Johns | Writing | Journalist, poet | Little magazines, socialism | |
| Merle De Vore Johnson | Visual arts | Cartoonist, illustrator, poet | | |
| Jeanne Judson | Writing | Editor, journalist, novelist | | Harper's Bazaar |
| Harry Kemp | Performance, writing | Playwright, poet, seafarer, stage actor | Provincetown Players, tramping, socialism | The Masses |
| Bernice Lesbia Kenyon | Writing | Editor, poet | | Scribner's Magazine |
| John G. Kidd | Publishing | Bookseller, publisher | Provincetown Players | |
| William Albion Kittredge | Visual arts | Book artist | | |
| Eastwood Lane | Performance | Composer | | |
| Lawrence Langner | Performance | Playwright, theater director | Little Theater Movement, Provincetown Players, Washington Square Players | |
| Christian Leden | Writing | Seafarer, travel writer | | The New York Times |
| Courtenay Lemon | Social groups | Critic, socialist activist | Socialism | |
| Sinclair Lewis | Writing | Critic, editor, novelist, poet | Socialism, Three Hours for Lunch Club | Babbitt (1922), Arrowsmith (1925) |
| Ludwig Lewisohn | Writing | Critic, novelist, teacher | | |
| Max Liebermann | Visual arts | Illustrator, printmaker | Berlin Secession | |
| Nicholas Vachel Lindsay | Visual arts, writing | Artist, critic, poet | Tramping | |
| Preston Lockwood | Writing | Journalist, teacher | World War I veteran | |
| Hendrick Willem Van Loon | Visual arts | Humorist, illustrator, teacher | | The Story of Mankind (1921) |
| Lingard Loud | Writing | Editor | World War I veteran | |
| Pierre Loving | Writing | Journalist, translator, writer | Little Theater Movement, Provincetown Players, World War I veteran | |
| Orson Lowell | Visual arts | Cartoonist, illustrator | | The American Boy |
| Charles R. Macauley | Visual arts | Cartoonist, illustrator | | |
| Kenneth Macgowan | Performance | Critic, director, producer | Little Theater Movement, Provincetown Players | La Cucaracha |
| Lawton Mackall | Writing | Critic, humorist | Three Hours for Lunch Club | |
| Hector MacQuarrie | Publishing, writing | Bookseller, writer | World War I veteran | The Bookman |
| John Albert Macy | Writing | Biographer, critic, editor | Socialism | |
| Jane Mander | Writing | Journalist, novelist | | |
| Don Marquis | Visual arts | Cartoonist, illustrator, writer | Three Hours for Lunch Club | Archy and mehitabel (1927) |
| H.A. Mathes | Visual arts | Illustrator | | |
| William McFee | Writing | Novelist, travel writer, seafarer | | The New York Times |
| Alexander McKay | Publishing | Editor, publisher | | |
| Hawley McLanahan | Visual arts | Architect | | |
| Charles M. McLean | Publishing | Bookseller, publisher | | |
| Ada Jaffray McVickar | Publishing | Bookseller | | |
| Scudder Midleton | Writing | Poet | World War I veteran | Harper's Magazine |
| George Middleton | Performance | Playwright | Provincetown Players | Polly With a Past (1917) |
| Roy Mitchell | Performance | Theater director | Little Theater Movement | |
| Christopher Morley | Writing | Journalist, novelist, poet | The Baker Street Irregulars, Three Hours for Lunch Club | Saturday Review of Literature |
| Robert Nathan | Writing | Novelist, screenwriter | | Portrait of Jennie (1940) |
| Dudley Nichols | Writing | Film director, screenwriter | World War I veteran | Bringing Up Baby (1938), Stagecoach (1939) |
| Robert Nichols | Writing | Poet, playwright | World War I veteran | |
| Charles Norman | Writing | Poet, seafarer | | |
| Joseph Jefferson O'Neil | Writing | Journalist | | |
| Ivan Opffer | Visual arts | Portraitist | | The Bookman |
| Martha Ostenso | Visual arts, writing | Artist, poet, screenwriter | | Wild Geese (1925) |
| Lou Paley | Writing | Poet, teacher | | |
| Edmund Lester Pearson | Writing | Editor, librarian, true crime author | | |
| Basil H. Pillard | Social groups | Teacher | | |
| Ethel McClellan Plumer | Visual arts | Cartoonist, illustrator | Society of Illustrators, women's suffrage | The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, Vogue |
| Alexander Popini | Visual arts | Illustrator | Little magazines, World War I veteran | The Masses |
| William MacLeod Raine | Writing | Historian, novelist | | |
| Ben Ray Redman | Writing | Critic, editor, writer | | Saturday Review of Literature |
| Charles J. Reed | Social groups | Restaurateur | Greenwich Village businesses | |
| Lola Ridge | Social groups, writing | Editor, poet | Guggenheim Fellowship, little magazines, socialism, women's suffrage | The Masses |
| Felix Rieseberg | Writing | Explorer, journalist, travel writer | Three Hours for Lunch Club | East Side, West Side (1927) |
| W. Adolphe Roberts | Writing | Journalist, novelist, travel writer | | Hearts International Magazine |
| Edwin Arlington Robinson | Writing | Playwright, poet | | Pulitzer Prize for Poetry (1922, 1925, 1928) |
| Edwin (Ted) Meade Robinson | Writing | Humorist, journalist, poet | | |
| Bruce Rogers | Visual arts | Book designer, illustrator, typographer | | Centaur (typeface) |
| L. Stuart Rose | Publishing | Critic, editor, publisher | World War I veteran | The Saturday Evening Post (editor) |
| Herb Roth | Visual arts | Cartoonist, illustrator | | New York World |
| Edward Royce | Performance | Theater director | | |
| Tony Sarg | Performance, visual arts | Illustrator, puppeteer, stage actor | Armory Show of 1913 | Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade (balloon designer, 1927) |
| Jacob Salwyn Schapiro | Writing | Historian, teacher | Socialism | |
| Walter Schnackenberg | Visual arts | Illustrator | | |
| Thomas Seltzer | Writing | Editor, journalist, translator | Little magazines | The Masses |
| Fern Forrester Shay | Visual arts | Illustrator | | |
| Margaret Caldwell Shotwell | Writing | Poet | | Publishers Weekly |
| Emil Siebern | Visual arts | Sculptor, teacher | | |
| Upton Sinclair | Writing | Journalist, novelist | Socialism | The Jungle (1906), The Brass Check (1919), Pulitzer Prize for Fiction (1943) |
| John Sloan | Visual arts | Painter | Armory Show of 1913, Art Students League, Ashcan School, socialism | The Masses |
| Thorne Smith | Writing | Humorist, poet, seafarer | World War I veteran | |
| David Tosh Smith | Social groups | Seafarer | World War I veteran | |
| Robert A. Smith | Social groups | Seafarer | World War I veteran | |
| Charles Somerville | Visual arts, writing | Illustrator, journalist | | |
| Vincent Starett | Writing | Journalist, poet, teacher, writer | The Baker Street Irregulars, Three Hours for Lunch Club | Saturday Review of Literature |
| Vilhjalmur Stefansson | Writing | Explorer, seafarer, travel writer | | |
| Donald Ogden Stewart | Writing | Humorist, novelist, screenwriter | Algonquin Round Table, Skull and Bones, socialism | The Philadelphia Story (1940 film) |
| Gordon Stiles | Writing | Fiction writer, journalist | World War I veteran | |
| Emily Strunsky | Social groups | | | |
| Genevieve Taggard | Writing | Editor, poet, teacher | Little magazines, socialism | The Masses |
| Gardner Teall | Visual arts | Illustrator | | |
| Sara Teasdale | Writing | Novelist, poet | | Pulitzer Prize for Poetry (1918) |
| Lloyd M. Thomas | Performance | | Provincetown Players, World War I veteran | |
| Basil Thompson | Writing | Editor, poet | Little magazines | |
| Paul Thompson | Visual arts, writing | Journalist, photographer | World War I reporter | |
| Helen Thurlow | Visual arts | Illustrator | | Women's Home Companion, Vogue |
| Adolph Treidler | Visual arts | Illustrator | Society of Illustrators | The Saturday Evening Post |
| Peter Underhill | | | | |
| Harvey P. Vaughn | Publishing | Publisher | Greenwich Village businesses | |
| Walter Vodges | Writing | Critic, journalist | | Los Angeles Times |
| Charles A. Voight | Visual arts | Cartoonist, illustrator | | Boston Traveler, Life, New York World |
| Mary Heaton Vorse | Visual arts, writing | Journalist, novelist, union organizer | Art Students League, Provincetown Players, socialism, women's suffrage | The Masses |
| Webb Waldron | Writing | Editor, journalist | World War I reporter | Esquire, Reader's Digest |
| John Leeming Walker | Social groups | Medical doctor, seafarer | Three Hours for Lunch Club | |
| Foster Ware | Writing | Journalist | | New York Evening Post, The New Yorker |
| John V. A. Weaver | Writing | Journalist, poet, screenwriter | Algonquin Round Table, World War I veteran | Chicago Daily News, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1938 film) |
| Luther E. Widen | Publishing, visual arts | Book designer, publisher, typographer | Little magazines, socialism | |
| Edward Arthur Wilson | Visual arts | Illustrator, mystic, seafarer | | |
| Lily Winner | Performance | Critic, playwright | Women's suffrage | Birth Control Review |
| Robert L. Wolf | Writing | Journalist, poet, writer | Little magazines, socialism | The Masses |
| Cuthbert Wright | Writing | Critic, poet, professor | | The New York Times, Commonweal |
| Zorach | Performance, visual arts | Artist | Armory Show of 1913, Art Students League, little magazines, Provincetown Players | |
| Theodore F. Zucker | Social groups | Professor, researcher | | |