George Ade: Hoosier, Author, Playwright and Humorist
Despite the declining popularity of his plays, Ade wrote four more; the last one, The Old Town, was produced on Broadway in 1910. Now in his forties, Ade retired from playwriting but continued to write essays, short stories, and fables for various magazines and newspapers. He also ventured into the relatively new field of moving pictures, where he wrote over a hundred silent movie scripts and directed ten films. In 1931, during the era of Prohibition, Ade produced one more book, The Old-Time Saloon. Vehemently opposed to the Eighteenth Amendment, Ade wrote the book as a gentle nostalgic reminder of an age when the town saloon was a gathering place for local characters.
The time to enjoy an European vacation is about three weeks after unpacking.
George Ade, "The Modern Fable of the Hungry Man from Bird Center and the Trans-Atlantic Touch," 1901
Ade visited Europe with John McCutcheon in 1895 and quickly developed a passion for travel that continued throughout his life. He toured Europe ten times, the West Indies eleven times, China and Japan four times, and circled the globe twice. When he wasn't traveling, Ade spent his summers at his beloved Hazelden
and his winters in a rented home
in Miami, Florida. In the summer of 1943, Ade suffered a stroke which left him partially paralyzed. That winter he was too ill to travel to Florida and was forced to rent a small house in Brook after oil rationing made it impossible to heat Hazelden. In early 1944, Ade suffered a series of heart attacks which left him comatose and he died on May 16, at the age of 78. Ade received an honorary degree in the humanities from Purdue University in 1926 and an honorary degree in laws from Indiana University in 1927. He had been a delegate to the Republican National Convention in 1908, served on Purdue's Board of Trustees from 1909 to 1916, was president of the Mark Twain Association, a member of the National Institute of Arts and Letters, and on the Executive Committee of the Authors Guild. Despite these accomplishments, in Purdue's Alumni Directory George Ade listed himself simply as an author from Brook, Indiana.
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