The Echoing Hills

N.p. N.p., 1956. Revised Draft script for the 1956 play, INSCRIBED on the title page, "For my dear friend Steve Fritchman / with gratitude for helping me bring it to life / Lester." Stephen Hole Fritchman was a noted minister of the First Unitarian Church of Los Angeles, which put on the only known production of play, which premiered on May 19, 1956, prior to the revised June, 1956 script found here. OCLC locates no holdings.

A dedicated socialist and self-proclaimed Communist, playwright and screenwriter Lester Cole was a noted member of the Hollywood Ten, blacklisted and imprisoned for refusing to answer questions before the House Committee on Un-Amercian Activities (HUAC) in 1947. A prolific screenwriter, Cole wrote screenplays for more than forty films between 1932 and 1947, though only three following the HUAC hearings, including the 1966 film "Born Free," under the pseudonym Gerald L.C. Copley, directed by James Hill, and starring Virginia McKenna and Bill Travers.

Written two years after Brown v. Board of Education, and a year after the murder of Emmett Till, Cole's "The Echoing Hills," about the life and death struggles of Abolitionists in pre-Civil War Virginia, drew direct parallels to the national civil rights struggles of 1956 and in 1850s Virginia.

Maroon titled Hart Stenographic Bureau wrappers. Title page present, dated June, 1956, noted as Revised, with credits for playwright Lester Cole. 122 leaves, with last page of text numbered 3-25. Mimeograph duplication, rectos only. Pages Near Fine, wrapper Near Fine, bound with two screw brads.

[Book #158700]