George Ade

     George Ade was an American writer, syndicated newspaper columnist, and playwright who, gained national notoriety at the turn of the twentieth century with his "Stories of the Streets and of the Town," a column that used street language and slang to describe daily life in Chicago, and a column of his fables in slang, which were humorous stories that featured vernacular speech and the liberal use of capitalization in his characters' dialog. Ade's fables in slang gained him wealth and fame as an American humorist, as well as earning him the nickname of the "Aesop of Indiana."  

      Born in February 9 1866 in Indiana as the a second youngest child of Adaline and John Ade. George was the second youngest of the family's seven children. George's father served as the Newton County, Indiana, recorder, and was also a banker in Kentland; his mother was a homemaker. George enjoyed reading from an early age, but he disliked manual labor and was not interested in becoming a farmer. Although he graduated from Kentland High School in 1881, his mother did not think he was ready for college. As a result, Ade remained in high school for another year before enrolling at Purdue University in 1883 on scholarship. 

          By the early 1900s, after twelve years in Chicago, Ade's writing had brought him financial success and he retired to a leisurely life in the country. Ade invested his earnings in Newton County, Indiana, farmland, eventually owning about 2,400 acres. In 1902, George's brother, William Ade, purchased on his behalf a 417-acre site of wooded land along the Iroquois River near the town of Brook in Newton County, Indiana. George initially intended to build a summer cottage. Instead, Chicago architect Billie Mann, a Sigma Chi fraternity brother, designed for Ade a two-story, fourteen-room country manor, which was constructed at an estimated cost of US$25,000. Ade named the property Hazelden, after his English grandparents' home, and moved from Chicago into the newly built residence in 1904. In addition to the Tudor Revival-style home, the property eventually included landscaped grounds, a swimming pool, greenhouse, barn, and caretaker's cottage, among other outbuildings. Ade also added an adjacent golf course and country club in 1910. 

         The best known of his plays that were produced on Broadway are The County Chairman and The College Widow, which were also adapted into motion pictures. While the presentations of his plays and musical comedies increased his wealth and international renown, Ade's legacy includes numerous newspaper columns, magazine articles, essays, and books that describe his perspective on American life in the late nineteenth and early decades of the twentieth century .wikipedia/George Ade