NAIL, ROBERT EDWARD, JR. (1908-1968). Robert Edward Nail, Jr., playwright and director, son of Robert Edward and Etta (Reilly) Nail, Sr., was born in Wolfe City, Texas, on September 13, 1908. As a child he moved with his family to Albany, where he graduated from high school. He had one brother and never married. Nail attended Lawrenceville Preparatory School in Lawrenceville, New Jersey, before entering Princeton University, from which he graduated in 1933 with a degree in drama. He was a member of Phi Beta Kappa. While at the university, he wrote The Time of Their Lives, considered by some to be the finest play ever written by a Princeton undergraduate. He worked for a time in New York before becoming director of the Fort Worth Little Theatre in 1933 and the Dallas Little Theatre in 1936. He also directed a theater group in Abilene before returning to Albany in 1937. That same year he was asked by the school superintendent, C. B. Downing, to write an outdoor drama for the senior class play. In the spring of 1938, with the help of Alice Reynolds, a long-time companion and accomplished musician, he produced Dr. Shackelford's Paradise with such success that it was expanded to include local adults and renamed the Fort Griffin Fandangle.^qv The same year he also wrote the Nativity, a Christmas play produced annually using local talent.

Nail entered the United States Army in 1942, was soon made captain, and was assigned to special services. In that role he wrote Men of Bataan, a play used to promote the sale of war bonds, and numerous scripts for "Letters from the Front" and "What's Your Name, Soldier?," radio programs widely aired during the war years. For his efforts he was awarded the Legion of Merit. After the war ended, Nail returned to Albany and revived the Fandangle. He continued to write plays, many of which were popular in the state's University Interscholastic League^qv competition.

In May 1968 Nail received an honorary doctorate from Hardin-Simmons University in Abilene. He served on the first Texas Fine Arts Commission. He died of a heart attack on November 11, 1968, in Albany and is buried in the Albany cemetery.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: Albany News, Forty-fifth Anniversary Fandangle Souvenir Edition, June 1983. Vertical Files, Barker Texas History Center, University of Texas at Austin.

Lawrence Clayton