The Algonquin Hotel Sells for $82 Million

Cornerstone Real Estate Advisors has acquired the Algonquin Hotel for $82 million, according Real Estate Weekly.

Introducing the New Yorker iPad App

2011 Thurber Treat Picnic - The First of Five Evenings of Good Friends, Good Food, and Great Books!

Thurber House will kick off the 26th season of Summer Literary Picnics, a series of outdoor dinners and readings with Ohio-connected authors. This year's Thurber Treat will take place on Wednesday, June 8 on the side lawn of Thurber House, 77 Jefferson Ave. (Rain site at State Auto Insurance, 518 E. Broad St.)

Winners of the Thurber Treat writing contest will be featured at the Picnic. This year they asked writers to choose from a selection of Thurber cartoons, write a caption for the cartoon, and then expand on the caption with a silly or sage story. Nancy Gilson, Arts Editor for the Columbus Dispatch, will serve as host for the evening.

Starting at 5:20, the Thurber House Young Docents will offer special guided tours of Thurber House. Picnicking will begin at 6:15 p.m.; guests can order a delicious catered dinner from Party Panache, or bring their own. You can also feel free to bring the alcoholic beverage of your choice. The program will begin at 7:00 p.m.

Tickets are $25 for the reading and dinner and $15 for the reading only. All dinner reservations must be made by 4 p.m. on Monday, June 6. Reading-only tickets are sold in advance and at the door. For more details, or to purchase tickets, call 614-464-1032 or visit www.thurberhouse.org.

From the Mail Bag

Dear Mr. Trumbull:

I wanted to thank you for posting the Thurber Treat Contest info. Without it, I never would have known about it, never would have entered, and thus definitely wouldn’t have been named a winner. I am very appreciative.

--Katherine J. Leisering.

Algonquin Hotel May be Sold

The Algonquin Hotel, the landmark, 174-room property that's been bought and sold four times in the last 15 years, may be about to change hands once again, according to a story on The Real Deal Online.

Robert Benchley Society Names Top Ten in 2011 Humor Writing Competition

BOSTON, JUNE 1, 2011 -- The Robert Benchley Society is happy to announce the top ten semi-finalists in the 2011 RBS Annual Humor Writing Award Competition. "Once again, we had the pleasure of receiving many fine entries and I thank our preliminary judges who had the difficult task of assigning a ranking to the essays," said David Trumbull, Chairman of the Robert Benchley Society. This year's semi-finalists, in alphabetical order:

• Mike Ball of Whitmore Lake, Mich., for The Gospel According to Saint Pauli
  
• Barb Best of Sherman Oaks, Calif., for Dial “M” for Maddening
  
• Dan Burt of Millbrook, Alabama, for How to Stack Things
  
• Rebecca Cardwell of Calgary Alberta, for How to Get Your Dog to Lose Weight
  
• David Crawford of Kelowna, British Columbia, for Size Matters
  
• Robert G. Ferrell of La Vernia, Texas, for Up the Greek Without a Paddle
  
• Tim French of Midway, Alabama, for The Old Man and the Leaf Blower
  
• Steve Shrott of Toronto, Ontario, for Unblocking the Block
  
• Edward Southerland of Sherman Texas, for Certificates of Authenticity
  
• Agata Stanford of Glens Falls, New York, for Report from the Chairman of the Adventurers Club

These top ten essays have been forwarded to humorist Mark Russell, who will decide on the final four, ranked in order from first place. The winners will be announced on Tuesday, July 5th, and the awards will be presented at the Robert Benchley Society Annual Awards Dinner on Saturday, November 12th, at the University Club of Washington, D.C. For details about the dinner and other activities planned for the Eighth International Annual Gathering "A Capitol Idea," November 11-13, 2011, CLICK HERE. Register NOW and avoid the July 1st price increase. This year's preliminary judges:

• Gordon Ernst, of Morgantown, W.V., author of Robert Benchley: An Annotated Bibliography, and a Director of the RBS
  
• Eileen Forster Keck, of Providence, R.I., a Director of the RBS
  
• Sharon Lyon, of Ottawa, Ontario, Secretary of the RBS
  
• Dan Montville, of Oak Park, Ill., author of Disabled Fables, 2008 1st place winner of the RBS Humor Writing Award, and Director of the RBS
  
• Tom Saunders, of Whitmore Lake, Mich., author of The Athletic Benchley, President of the “Moderate State of Preservation” Chapter of the RBS
  
• Ed Tasca, of Toronto, Ontario, 2009 1st place winner of the RBS Humor Writing Award, and Director of the RBS.

New Conference Humor Panel: ‘How To Become An Algonquin Wit’

Discover how the great Robert Benchley – columnist, actor, New Yorker critic, Algonquin Round Table regular and the man who quipped “The free-lance writer gets paid per piece or per word or perhaps” – can inspire you to tackle the silly and absurd side of life at the 2011 “Rebound In Motown” conference of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists.

Thom Saunders has uncovered Benchley’s little-known essays from the rarely explored archives of the Detroit Athletic Club’s private literary magazine and collected them into a new, award-winning book, “The Athletic Benchley” – a surprising title when it comes to the author of “How to Sleep” and “I Like to Loaf.”

Saunders – winner of the Robert Benchley Award for Humor in 2005 – will be joined by Benchley fans Ken Voyles of the Athletic Club as well as New York Times bestselling humor author, 2006 Benchley Award winner and Columnist of the Year Bruce Cameron; Erma Bombeck Award winner Mike Ball; and Radio Hall of Famer and Detroit comedy icon Dick Purtan. They’ll explore what you can learn from the man who wrote “The Sex Life of the Polyp” while attempting to heed Benchley’s warning that, “There are no lengths to which humorless people will not go to analyze Humor.”

Panel topics include:
• Don't be funny – be funny consistently
• No one cares about your dog except you
• Building funny platforms and sidestepping OSHA
• Algonquin humor – without the three (or 12 martinis)
• If you think you have been funny, where do you send it? Humor's sordid side.

The panel takes place on the afternoon of Friday, June 24, during the Rebound in Motown conference of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists, June 23-26 at the restored four-diamond Westin Book-Cadillac in Detroit.

A conference special rate to all members in good standing of the Robert Benchley Society and the Erma Bombeck Writers Workshop is available for $299 with a registration for two or more nights at the Book-Cadillac. You can find a complete conference schedule here, special discount hotel registration here for $124 per night with free Internet and discount valet parking, airline and rental car discounts here, and conference registration here.

See you in Detroit!