T. Lawrason Riggs
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Thomas Lawrason Riggs (1888–1943) was an American Catholic priest and musical theatre lyricist. Riggs was the first Catholic chaplain of Yale University.[1]
The grandson of banker George Washington Riggs, Riggs was from a wealthy upper class Episcopalian family.[2] In his youth Riggs was an acquaintance of the artist L. Bancel LaFarge, and came to know Thornton Wilder, Monty Woolley and other notable creative people while at Yale.[1] Riggs was the president of the Yale Dramatic Society and a member of the Scroll and Key collegiate society.[1] Riggs was a member of the Yale University Pundits, a senior society and literary group. He had a great love for the keeping of diaries and was the secretary of his class year.[3]
Graduating from Yale as a member of the class of 1910, Riggs embarked on graduate studies at Harvard University as an assistant to Barrett Wendell, which were interrupted by his foray into musical theatre.[1] Riggs never completed his doctorate.[1]
Riggs was Cole Porter's roommate at Yale, and with Porter wrote See America First, a patriotic comic opera that spoofed the "flag waving" musicals of George M. Cohan.[4] See America First received a poor critical reception when it opened on Broadway in March 1916 following previews in New Haven, Connecticut and Rochester, New York. Riggs had invested $35,000 in the production and never worked on another musical.[4]
Riggs joined the Yale Mobile Hospital unit at the United States entry into World War I in 1917, and later served as a specialist in foreign languages to military intelligence in Paris.[1]
