ANS signed “Ernie,” at the conclusion of an 8 x 5.75 Western Union telegram dated April 1, 1950. Note in response to the telegram. In full: “I challenge you Crouse you louse or I will defend yours without mercy Your old colleague but implacable enemy on this terrain, Ernie.” The telegram, sent by Russel Crouse to Leonard Lyons, in full: “Where does Ernie Hemmingway [sic] get off claiming title of worst-dressed man which I have held since the day Heywood Broun relinquished it. When there is a new wrinkle in clothes you could always find it in mine.” Intersecting folds and scattered creases, otherwise fine condition.
Taking a job at the Kansas City Star immediately after graduating from high school in 1918, Hemingway met and quickly befriended Russel Crouse, a journalist six years his senior who would go on to have a successful career as a playwright, winning the 1946 Pulitzer Prize for the play State of the Union and a Tony Award for The Sound of Music. Both would later befriend Leonard Lyons, one of the most famous columnists of his era. Another journalist of the period—Heywood Broun—was undoubtedly one of the worst-dressed newspapermen in American history, with a style that can only be described as 'haphazard.' After he passed in 1939, the title was up for grabs—and Hemingway and Crouse scrambled to claim it. In this witty and playfully worded response to Crouse's claim to the throne, Hemingway reveals a side of himself seldom seen by his admirers, and uses the rare "Ernie" to sign off, as he was known to his early colleague.
RR Auction COA.
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