Margarite Frances Baird
Encyclopedia
Marguerite Frances Baird (1890— 23 September 1970, also known as Peggy Baird, Peggy Johns, and Peggy Cowley) was an American landscape painter. She was married to poet-playwright Orrick Johns and writer Malcolm Cowley
and was the lover of playwright Eugene O'Neill
and poet Hart Crane
.
Baird was a member of the women's suffrage movement. In 1917, she invited Dorothy Day
to join the National Woman's Party
. They were jailed for 60 days for their protests but were released after 16 days and pardoned by President Woodrow Wilson
.http://www.catholicworker.org/dorothyday/daytext.cfm?TextID=504
After her first husband, Johns, died, she married, in 1919, Malcolm Cowley. In 1931 she moved to Mexico to obtain a divorce. While there her long friendship with poet Hart Crane
turned into Crane's first and only documented heterosexual affair. As Crane wrote to a friend about his romance with Peggy Cowley, "Rather amazing things have happened to me since Xmas. Peggy Cowley ... is mainly responsible". This affair has since become a major point of interest for Crane scholars—particularly for those reading him with an eye toward his sexuality—as his engagement with heterosexual life is a determining theme in his last major poem, "The Broken Tower
". Appearing at moments to be a highly symbolic affirmation of their relationship, as well as a denial of his homosexual past (the 'broken tower' can be read as a defeated phallus), the poem was written just months before Crane committed suicide by jumping off the side of a boat in 1932, while on a trip to New York City.
Though their relationship had begun to deteriorate by that time (Crane said he had "misunderstood and misinterpreted Peggy's character quite badly"), Cowley was with Crane on the boat, and she figures briefly, but poignantly, in the events leading up to his death.http://speccoll.library.kent.edu/literature/poetry/crane.html Almost thirty years later, she wrote about this period in an article for Venture, "The Last Days of Hart Crane."
After Crane's death, Cowley married twice more and converted to Catholicism. She died of cancer at a home for destitute in Tivoli, New York.http://www.catholicworker.org/dorothyday/daytext.cfm?TextID=504
Malcolm Cowley
Malcolm Cowley was an American novelist, poet, literary critic, and journalist.-Early life:...
and was the lover of playwright Eugene O'Neill
Eugene O'Neill
Eugene Gladstone O'Neill was an American playwright and Nobel laureate in Literature. His poetically titled plays were among the first to introduce into American drama techniques of realism earlier associated with Russian playwright Anton Chekhov, Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen, and Swedish...
and poet Hart Crane
Hart Crane
-Career:Throughout the early 1920s, small but well-respected literary magazines published some of Crane’s lyrics, gaining him, among the avant-garde, a respect that White Buildings , his first volume, ratified and strengthened...
.
Baird was a member of the women's suffrage movement. In 1917, she invited Dorothy Day
Dorothy Day
Dorothy Day was an American journalist, social activist and devout Catholic convert; she advocated the Catholic economic theory of Distributism. She was also considered to be an anarchist, and did not hesitate to use the term...
to join the National Woman's Party
National Woman's Party
The National Woman's Party , was a women's organization founded by Alice Paul in 1915 that fought for women's rights during the early 20th century in the United States, particularly for the right to vote on the same terms as men...
. They were jailed for 60 days for their protests but were released after 16 days and pardoned by President Woodrow Wilson
Woodrow Wilson
Thomas Woodrow Wilson was the 28th President of the United States, from 1913 to 1921. A leader of the Progressive Movement, he served as President of Princeton University from 1902 to 1910, and then as the Governor of New Jersey from 1911 to 1913...
.http://www.catholicworker.org/dorothyday/daytext.cfm?TextID=504
After her first husband, Johns, died, she married, in 1919, Malcolm Cowley. In 1931 she moved to Mexico to obtain a divorce. While there her long friendship with poet Hart Crane
Hart Crane
-Career:Throughout the early 1920s, small but well-respected literary magazines published some of Crane’s lyrics, gaining him, among the avant-garde, a respect that White Buildings , his first volume, ratified and strengthened...
turned into Crane's first and only documented heterosexual affair. As Crane wrote to a friend about his romance with Peggy Cowley, "Rather amazing things have happened to me since Xmas. Peggy Cowley ... is mainly responsible". This affair has since become a major point of interest for Crane scholars—particularly for those reading him with an eye toward his sexuality—as his engagement with heterosexual life is a determining theme in his last major poem, "The Broken Tower
The Broken Tower
The last new poem meant to be published in Hart Crane's life, 'The Broken Tower' has been widely acknowledged as one of the best lyrics of Crane's last years, if not his career...
". Appearing at moments to be a highly symbolic affirmation of their relationship, as well as a denial of his homosexual past (the 'broken tower' can be read as a defeated phallus), the poem was written just months before Crane committed suicide by jumping off the side of a boat in 1932, while on a trip to New York City.
Though their relationship had begun to deteriorate by that time (Crane said he had "misunderstood and misinterpreted Peggy's character quite badly"), Cowley was with Crane on the boat, and she figures briefly, but poignantly, in the events leading up to his death.http://speccoll.library.kent.edu/literature/poetry/crane.html Almost thirty years later, she wrote about this period in an article for Venture, "The Last Days of Hart Crane."
After Crane's death, Cowley married twice more and converted to Catholicism. She died of cancer at a home for destitute in Tivoli, New York.http://www.catholicworker.org/dorothyday/daytext.cfm?TextID=504