Savage, George Milton, 1904-

Tacoma native, George Milton Savage (1904-1977), was a playwright and University of Washington faculty member who was active in the theater and writing scene in the Pacific Northwest during the 1930s and 1940s, before moving to Los Angeles.

Savage, the son of a prominent Tacoma contractor, attended the Phillips Exeter Academy and received his undergraduate and graduate degrees from the University of Washington, where he taught composition and literature from 1930 to 1951. Over his lifetime, Savage wrote 72 plays, a number of them in collaboration with his son, George Savage, Jr. Earlier in his career, he occasionally had written under the pseudonym of Kerry Fairfax. Savage's career took off in 1937 when his play about a sit-down strike, See How They Run, won a play competition co-sponsored by the Federal Theatre Project and the Dramatists Guild. While associated with the UW Department of English, Savage served as a mentor to many students and aspiring writers, some of whom, including Betty MacDonald, also went on to have successful careers. In 1943, Savage established the Tryout Theatre in Seattle, which was dedicated to the production of newly written plays, including some of his own. In 1945, he organized a writer's conference in Seattle that was a predecessor to the Pacific Northwest Writers Conference. In 1951, Savage moved to the University of California, Los Angeles in order to direct graduate work for their theater arts department. Savage retired from the University of California, Los Angeles in 1971, but continued teaching in the school's extension unit before returning to Seattle in 1975.

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