Lemuel Ayers

[1] He won three Tony Awards in 1949, for the original production of Cole Porter's Kiss Me, Kate (1948), for which he designed both costumes and sets and worked as producer.

[3] He made his Broadway debut as the scenic designer for producer and director Leonard Sillman's 1939 revival of R. C. Sherriff's Journey's End starring Colin Keith-Johnston as Stanhope.

That same year he designed sets for a revival of Sidney Howard's They Knew What They Wanted with June Walker as Amy and Douglass Montgomery as Joe.

He designed sets for the Broadway productions of Robert Wallsten and Mignon G. Eberhart's Eight O'Clock Tuesday (1941), Max Catto's They Walk Alone (1941), James Edward Grant's Plan M (1942), Norma Mitchell and John Harris's Autumn Hill (1942), S. N. Behrman's The Pirate (1942), Norman Armstrong's Lifeline (1942), John Patrick's The Willow and I (1942), Florence Ryerson's Harriet (1943), Rodgers and Hammerstein's landmark production ofOklahoma!

His widow said she hoped the fund, which was to be administered by the New York Hospital, would "help prevent other tragic wastes of life and talent by incurable types of cancer."