Henry Martyn Blossom Jr. (May 10, 1866 – March 23, 1919) was an American writer, playwright, novelist, opera librettist, and lyricist.
Checkers was soon followed by Blossom's first critical success as a lyricist, the comic opera The Yankee Consul (1903), on which he collaborated with fellow Saint Louis resident and composer Alfred G. Robyn.
Blossom also wrote the lyrics and books for Broadway musicals made with composers Leslie Stuart, Raymond Hubbell, and Zoel Parenteau.
[1] He was educated at the Stoddard School in Saint Louis,[1] and worked for his father's insurance company before pursuing a career as a writer.
[5] The plot involves a love story about a man trying to win approval of his would-be father-in-law as he faces career hurdles and tries to distance himself from gambling and horse racing.
The first film from 1913 used a screenplay by Eustace Hale Ball and Lawrence McGill,[6] and was directed by Augustus Thomas.
[8] The work reached Broadway in 1904 and was a tremendous critical success for its star, Raymond Hitchcock, in the role of Abijah Booze.
[10] His first musical, The Slim Princess, had debuted the year before and was created in collaboration with composer Leslie Stuart.
[14] They also wrote the songs "It's Not the Uniform That Makes the Man" with A. Baldwin Sloane in 1917 and "I Want to Go Back to the War" with Percival Knight (music was by Raymond Hubbell) in 1919.