Arthur Everett “Chick” Austin Jr. Buried in the Cemetery on the Hill.

The Cemetery Trustees have recently installed a sign on the Cemetery on the Hill, recognizing the donation of the “Austin Section” by A. Everett “Chick” Austin, Jr.

     We learn more about this donation from Austin’s biography, “Magician of the Modern…,” by Eugene Gaddis, Chapter Eighteen; “In June Chick returned to Windham with Jim Hellyar, relieved to step back into the roles of theater producer and actor. Walking back and forth in Rose Crucius’s kitchen every morning, helping himself to whatever she was baking as it came out of the oven, sipping coffee or the eggnog she made to ease his persistent cough, Chick outlined his grandiose schemes for his theater and his future career. Often she and Herb would hear him say, almost to himself, “I just need a million…’ ”

    “The 1956 season was sophisticated and up to date. Among the eight plays were The Rainmaker…, Tea and Sympathy…, and Anastasia…in which Chick played Prince Bounine. Marble Fireplaces and French doors appeared on stage in the barn, and his mother’s pictures and antiques once again began migrating down to the Playhouse. By now, Chick’s loyal and eager audience was well established . Attendance was high, and he would have the money to spend on his European holiday.”

    “Chick was only fifty-five, but was feeling old. Although he did not seem to be seriously ill, he talked to Rose and Herb Crucius about his death, a subject he always avoided. Once at a party in Sarasota, (where he was the Director of the Ringling Museum.) when the discussion turned to wills, Chick announced, in front of Helen and Jim, that he did not have a will and never would have a will. ‘When I go,’ he added ‘you’re all going to have to fight over it.’ ‘With that’ said Jim, ‘we all had another martini.’ ” But that summer, he gave a parcel of land between the Playhouse and the old cemetery in the town of Windham, reserving a large plot near Range Road for himself, Helen and the children. Which he intended to enclose in a wrought-iron fence fifty feet square. When Sally visited the Playhouse, she found he had sketched monuments for each of their graves and had tacked them up in the box office. They were all Egyptian obelisks.” Chick Austin did travel to France that summer and while there purchased a 1956 Rolls Royce Silver  Cloud…Chick Austin died on March 29, 1957. “On the morning after the funeral, through steady rain, the hearse, followed by Helen and the children and a few friends, took Chick back to Windham. Herb Crucius had helped dig the grave in the plot of land that Chick had given the town the previous summer. It was on a little rise, just inside the stone wall along Range Road. The red barn with the huge letters WINDHAM PLAYHOUSE, could be seen through the bare trees. It was three o’clock when the burial service began…” You can learn more about the incredible life of A. Everett Austin in his biography, Magician of the Modern, Chick Austin and the Transformation of the arts in America” by Eugene R. Gaddis.