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A Fitzgerald Chronology

1853
Birth of Edward Fitzgerald at “Glenmary” farm near Rockville in Montgomery County, Maryland.

1858
Birth of Anthony D. Sayre in Tuskegee, Alabama. 

1860
Birth of Mary (“Mollie”) McQuillan in St. Paul, Minnesota. Birth of Minnie Buckner Machen in Eddyville, Kentucky.

June 1884
Marriage of Anthony Sayre and Minnie Machen at “Mineral Mount”, near Eddyville, Kentucky.

13 February 1890
Marriage of Edward Fitzgerald and Mollie McQuillan in Washington, D.C.

24 September 1896
Birth of Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald at 481 Laurel Avenue, St. Paul, Minnesota.

April 1898
After failure of his St. Paul furniture factory, Edward Fitzgerald takes job as salesman with Procter & Gamble in Buffalo, New York.

24 July 1900
Birth of Zelda Sayre at South Street, Montgomery, Alabama.

January 1901
Fitzgerald family moves to Syracuse, New York.

July 1901
Birth of Annabel Fitzgerald, FSF’s sister.

September 1903
Fitzgerald family moves back to Buffalo.

1907
Sayre family moves to 6 Pleasant Avenue, Zelda’s home until her marriage.

March 1908
Edward Fitzgerald loses his job.

July 1908
The Fitzgerald family returns to St. Paul.  FSF enters St. Paul Academy in September.

1909
Judge Sayre of the City Court is appointed Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of Alabama.

October 1909
Publication of “The Mystery of the Raymond Mortgage” in St. Paul Academy Now & Then", FSF’s first appearance in print.

August 1911
FSF writes his first play, The Girl from Lazy J, produced in St. Paul.

September 1911
FSF enters Newman School, Hackensack, New Jersey.

August 1912
Production of FSF’s second play, The Captured Shadow, in St. Paul.

November 1912
FSF meets Father Sigourney Fay and Shane Leslie.

August 1913
Production of FSF’s third play, “Coward,”  in St. Paul.

September 1913
FSF enters Princeton University with Class of 1917; meets Edmund Wilson ’16 and John Peale Bishop ’17.

September 1914
Production of FSF’s fourth play, Assorted Spirits, in St. Paul.

Fall 1914
FSF contributes to Princeton Tiger.  Zelda Sayre enters Sidney Lanier High School.

December 1914
Production of Fie! Fie! Fi-Fi!, FSF’s first Princeton Triangle Club show.

4 January 1915
FSF meets Ginevra King, his first serious romantic interest, in St. Paul.

April 1915
“Shadow Laurels,” a play, is FSF’s first publication in Nassau Literary Magazine.

June 1915
FSF’s “The Ordeal,” later thoroughly revised as “Benediction,” is his first story published in Nassau Literary Magazine.

28 November 1915
FSF drops out of Princeton for remainder of junior year.

December 1915
Production by Triangle Club of  The Evil Eye, for which FSF wrote lyrics.

September 1916
FSF returns to Princeton as member of Class of 1918.

December 1916
Production of Triangle Club of Safety First, for which FSF wrote lyrics.

26 October 1917
FSF receives commission as infantry 2nd lieutenant.

20 November 1917
FSF reports to Fort Leavenworth, Kansas; begins novel “The Romantic Egotist.”

End of February 1918
FSF completes first draft of “The Romantic Egotist” on leave at Princeton; submits novel to Scribners.

15 March 1918
FSF reports to Camp Taylor, Louisville, Kentucky.

April 1918
FSF transferred to Camp Gordon, Georgia.

May 1918
Zelda Sayre  graduates from Sidney Lanier High School.

June 1918
FSF reports to Camp Sheridan near Montgomery, Alabama.

July 1918
FSF and Zelda Sayre meet at country club dance in Montgomery.

August 1918
Scribners declines “The Romantic Egotist”; revised typescript rejected in October.

26 October 1918
FSF reports to Camp Mills, Long Island, to await embarkation; war ends before unit sent overseas.

Late November 1918
FSF returns to Camp Sheridan; becomes aide-de-camp to General J. A. Ryan.

February 1919
FSF discharged from army. Planning to marry Zelda Sayre, he goes to New York and works for the Barron Collier advertising agency; lives in room at 200 Claremont Avenue and tries unsuccessfully to break into the magazine market.

Spring 1919
FSF visits Montgomery in April, May and June as Zelda Sayre remains reluctant to commit herself to marriage.

June 1919
Zelda Sayre breaks engagement.

July-August 1919
FSF quits advertising job and returns to St. Paul; rewrites novel while living with parents at 599 Summit Avenue.

September 1919
The Smart Set publishes “Babes in the Woods,” FSF’s first commercial story sale.

16 September 1919
Maxwell Perkins of Scribners accepts novel, now titled This Side of Paradise.

November 1919
FSF becomes client of Harold Ober at Reynolds agency. First sale to The Saturday Evening Post: “Head and Shoulders.”  FSF visits Zelda Sayre in Montgomery.

November 1919-February 1920
The Smart Set publishes “The Debutante,” “Porcelain and Pink,” “Benediction,” and “Dalyrimple Goes Wrong.”

Mid-January 1920
FSF lives in boarding house at 2900 Prytania Street in New Orleans, where he stays less than a month. Engagement to Zelda Sayre resumes during his visits to Montgomery.

March-May 1920
“Myra Meets His Family,” “The Camel’s Back,” “Bernice Bobs Her Hair,” “The Ice Palace,” and “The Offshore Pirate” appear in The Saturday Evening Post.

26 March 1920
Publication of This Side of Paradise.

3 April 1920
Marriage of FSF and Zelda Sayre at rectory of St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York. Honeymoon at Biltmore Hotel.

May-September 1920
Fitzgeralds rent house at Westport, Connecticut, where FSF works on The Beautiful and Damned.

July 1920
Publication of  “May Day” in The Smart Set.

Summer 1920
Fitzgeralds drive to Montgomery; return to Westport by mid-August.

10 September 1920
Publication of Flappers and Philosophers, FSF’s first short-story collection.

October 1920-April 1921
Fitzgeralds take apartment at 38 West 59th Street, New York City.

3 May-July 1921
Fitzgeralds make first trip to Europe; sail to England, then visit France and Italy. Return home and visit Montgomery.

August 1921
Fitzgeralds travel to St. Paul; rent house at Dellwood, White Bear Lake.

September 1921-March 1922
The Beautiful and Damned serialized in Metropolitan Magazine.

26 October 1921
Birth of the Fitzgeralds’ daughter, Scottie.

November 1921-June 1922
Fitzgeralds rent house at 626 Goodrich Avenue, St. Paul.

4 March 1922
Publication of The Beautiful and Damned.

2 April 1922
“Friend Husband’s Latest,” a tongue-in-cheek review of The Beautiful and Damned that is ZF’s first commercial publication, appears in The New York Tribune.

Summer 1922
Fitzgeralds move to White Bear Yacht Club.

June 1922
Publication of “The Diamond as Big as the Ritz” in The Smart Set.

22 September 1922
Publication of Tales of the Jazz Age, FSF’s second collection of short stories.

Mid-October 1922-April 1924
Fitzgeralds rent house at 6 Gateway Drive in Great Neck, Long Island. Friendship with Ring Lardner.

December 1922
Publication of “Winter Dreams” in Metropolitan Magazine.

27 April 1923
Publication of FSF’s play The Vegetable.

19 November 1923
The Vegetable fails at tryout in Atlantic City, New Jersey.

5 April 1924
“How to live on $36,000 a Year” published in The Saturday Evening Post.

Mid-April 1924
Fitzgeralds sail for France.

May 1924
Fitzgeralds visit Paris, then leave for Riviera; stop at Grimm’s Park Hotel in Hyères and settle in June at Villa Marie, Valescure, St. Raphaël.

June 1924
Publication of “Absolution” in The American Mercury.

July 1924
ZF becomes involved with French aviator Edouard Jozan.  Publication of “‘The Sensible Thing’” in Liberty.

Summer 1924 
Fitzgeralds meet Gerald and Sara Murphy at Cap d’Antibes.

Summer-Fall 1924
FSF writes The Great Gatsby.

ca. 10 October 1924
FSF writes to Maxwell Perkins about promising young American writer Ernest Hemingway.

October 1924-Februrary 1925
Fitzgeralds at Hôtel des Princes, Rome, where FSF revises galleys of The Great Gatsby.

February 1925
Fitzgeralds travel to Capri; at Hotel Tiberio.

10 April 1925
Publication of The Great Gatsby.

Late April 1925
Fitzgeralds move to Paris; rent apartment at 14 rue de Tilsitt.

May 1925
FSF meets Ernest Hemingway in Dingo bar.

Summer 1925
FSF starts planning Francis Melarky version of Tender Is the Night.

August 1925
Fitzgeralds leave Paris for month at Antibes.

January 1926
ZF takes “cure” at Salies-de-Béarn.

January and February 1926
Publication of “The Rich Boy” in Redbook Magazine.

February 1926
Play version of The Great Gatsby, by Owen Davis, produced on Broadway.

26 February 1926
Publication of All the Sad Young Men, FSF’s third short-story collection.

Early March 1926
Fitzgeralds return to Riviera and rent Villa Paquita at Juan-les-Pins.

May 1926
Hemingways join Murphys and Fitzgeralds on Riviera. Fitzgeralds move to Villa St. Louis, Juan-les-Pins where they remain until end of 1926. “How to Waste Material: A Note on My Generation” is published in The Bookman.

December 1926
Fitzgeralds return to America.

January 1927
Fitzgeralds go to Hollywood so that FSF can work on “Lipstick” (unproduced) for United Artists. They meet young actress Lois Moran.

March 1927- March 1928
Fitzgeralds rent “Ellerslie,” near Wilmington, Delaware. ZF begins ballet lessons.

April 1928
Fitzgeralds return to Europe.

April-August 1928
Fitzgeralds rent apartment at 58 rue de Vaugirard, Paris.

28 April 1928

Publication in The Saturday Evening Post of “The Scandal Detectives,” first of eight-story Basil Duke Lee series.

Mid-summer 1928
ZF begins ballet training with Mme. Lubov Egorova in Paris.

7 October 1928
Fitzgeralds return to America.

October 1928-March 1929
Fitzgeralds at “Ellerslie.”

2 March 1929
Publication of “The Last of the Belles” in The Saturday Evening Post.

March 1929
Fitzgeralds return to Europe; travel from Genoa along Riviera, then to Paris.

June 1929
Fitzgeralds leave Paris for Riviera; rent Villa Fleur des Bois, Cannes.

July 1929
Publication of ZF’s “The Original Follies Girl” in College Humor.

October 1929
Fitzgeralds return by car to Paris by way of Provence; take apartment at 10 rue Pergolese.

February 1930
FSF and ZF travel to North Africa.

5 April 1930
Publication in The Saturday Evening Post of “First Blood,” first of five-story Josephine Perry series.

23 April-11 May 1930  
Suffering her first emotional breakdown, ZF is hospitalized at Malmaison Clinic outside Paris; she discharges herself.

22 May 1930  
ZF is hospitalized at Val-Mont Clinic in Glion, Switzerland.

5 June 1930
ZF enters Prangins clinic at Nyon, Switzerland.

Summer and Fall 1930
FSF lives in Switzerland.

11 October 1930 
“One Trip Abroad,” the story of an American couple who deteriorate in Europe,  published in The Saturday Evening Post.

26 January 1931
Death of Edward Fitzgerald. FSF returns alone to America to attend burial; reports to Sayres about ZF.

21 February 1931
Publication of “Babylon Revisited” in The Saturday Evening Post.

July 1931
Fitzgeralds spend two weeks at Lake Annecy, France.

15 August 1931
“Emotional Bankruptcy” published in The Saturday Evening Post.

15 September 1931
ZF released from Prangins. Fitzgeralds return to America.

September 1931-Spring 1932
Fitzgeralds rent house at 819 Felder Avenue in Montgomery. FSF goes to Hollywood alone to work on Red-Headed Woman for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

17 November 1931
Death of Judge Sayre.

12 February 1932
ZF suffers second breakdown; enters Phipps Psychiatric Clinic of Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore.

March 1932
ZF completes first draft of her novel, Save Me the Waltz, while at Phipps Clinic.

20 May 1932-November 1933
FSF rents “La Paix” at Towson outside Baltimore.

26 June 1932
ZF discharged from Phipps; joins family at “La Paix.”

October 1932 
“Crazy Sunday” published in The American Mercury.

7 October 1932
Publication of ZF’s novel, Save Me the Waltz.

26 June-1 July 1933
ZF’s play, Scandalabra, produced by Vagabond Junior Players in Baltimore.

11 October 1933  
“Ring,” FSF’s memorial tribute to Ring Lardner, published in The New Republic.

December 1933
FSF rents house at 1307 Park Avenue, Baltimore.

January-April 1934
Serialization of Tender Is the Night in Scribner’s Magazine.

12 February 1934 
ZF’s third breakdown; returns to Phipps Clinic.

March 1934  
ZF Transferred to Craig House, Beacon, New York.

29 March-30 April 1934
ZF’s art exhibition in New York.

12 April 1934
Publication of Tender Is the Night.

19 May 1934
ZF transferred back to Sheppard-Pratt Hospital outside Baltimore.

February 1935
FSF at Oak Hall Hotel in Tryon, North Carolina.

20 March 1935
Publication of Taps at Reveille, FSF’s fourth short-story collection.

May 1935
FSF spends summer at Grove Park Inn, Asheville, North Carolina.

September 1935
FSF takes apartment at Cambridge Arms, Charles Street, Baltimore.

November 1935
FSF at Skyland Hotel in Hendersonville, North Carolina; begins writing “The Crack-Up” essays.

February-April 1936
“The Crack-Up” essays published in Esquire.

8 April 1936
ZF enters Highland Hospital in Asheville.

July-December 1936
FSF returns to Grove Park Inn.

August 1936
Hemingway’s “The Snows of Kilimanjaro" with its reference to “poor Scott Fitzgerald" published in Esquire, which includes in the same issue FSF’s “Afternoon of an Author.”

September 1936
Death of Mollie McQuillan Fitzgerald in Washington. Scottie enters Ethel Walker School in Connecticut.

January-June 1937
FSF at Oak Hall Hotel in Tryon, North Carolina.

6 March 1937
“‘Trouble,’” FSF’s last story in The Saturday Evening Post, is published.

July 1937
Deeply in debt, FSF goes to Hollywood for third time with six-month MGM contract at $1,000 a week. Lives at Garden of Allah on Sunset Boulevard; meets movie columnist Sheilah Graham 14 July.

July 1937-February 1938
FSF works on Three Comrades script, his only screen credit.

First week of September 1937
FSF visits ZF in Asheville; they spend four days in Charleston and Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.

December 1937
FSF’s MGM contract renewed for one year at $1,250 a week.

February 1938-January 1939
FSF works on scripts for “Infidelity,” Marie Antoinette, The Women, and Madame Curie.

End of March 1938
Fitzgeralds spend Easter at Virginia Beach, Virginia.

April 1938
FSF rents bungalow at Malibu Beach, California.

September 1938
Scottie Fitzgerald enters Vassar College.

November 1938
FSF moves to cottage at “Belly Acres,” Encino.

December 1938
FSF’s MGM contract not renewed.

January 1939
FSF works briefly on Gone With the Wind.

10-12 February 1939
FSF travels to Dartmouth College with Budd Schulberg to work on Winter Carnival; fired for drunkenness.  FSF is hospitalized in New York.

March 1939-October 1940
FSF takes free-lance jobs at Paramount, Universal, Twentieth Century-Fox, Goldwyn and Columbia studios.

April 1939
Fitzgeralds travel to Cuba. FSF goes on bender; is hospitalized on return to New York.

July 1939
FSF breaks with his longtime agent Harold Ober.

Summer 1939
FSF begins work on The Last Tycoon.

September 1939
FSF unsuccessfully attempts to sell serial rights to his work-in-progress to Collier’s.

January 1940
Publication in Esquire of  “Pat Hobby’s Christmas Wish,” first of seventeen-story series.

March-August 1940
FSF works on “Cosmopolitan” (“Babylon Revisited”) script; it is not produced.

ca. 15 April 1940
ZF discharged from Highland Hospital; lives with her mother at 322 Sayre Street in Montgomery.

May 1940
FSF moves to 1403 North Laurel Avenue, Hollywood.

21 December 1940
FSF dies of heart attack at Sheilah Graham’s apartment, 1443 North Hayworth Avenue, Hollywood.

27 December 1940
FSF buried in Rockville Union Cemetery, Rockville, Maryland.

27 October 1941
Publication of The Last Tycoon.

12 August 1945
Publication of The Crack-Up.

September 1945
Publication of The Portable F. Scott Fitzgerald.

November 1947
ZF returns to Highland Hospital from Montgomery.

10 March 1948
ZF dies in fire at Highland Hospital.

17 March 1948
ZF buried with FSF.

18 November 1950
Scottie Fitzgerald Lanahan donates the Fitzgerald Papers to Princeton University.

7 November 1975
FSF and ZF reinterred in the Fitzgerald family plot at St. Mary’s church, Rockville, Maryland.

18 June 1986
Scottie Fitzgerald Lanahan Smith dies; she is buried with her parents at St. Mary’s church, Rockville.

 


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