At the end of World War I, "Vanity Fair" writers and Algonquin regulars Dorothy Parker, Robert Benchley, and Robert E. Sherwood started meeting for lunch at The Algonquin. Alexander Woollcott, acerbic critic and war correspondent, received a warm welcome from literary friends in 1919. They gathered in the Rose Room that afternoon; one person enjoyed the event enough to request that it become a daily event. That same request prompted a daily exchange of ideas and opinions shared between highly esteemed literary figures. George S. Kaufman, Heywood Broun, and Edna Ferber were also a part of this august assembly; these individuals influenced writers like F. Scott Fitzgerald and Ernest Hemingway. They founded "The New Yorker" magazine; all hotel guests receive free copies to this day.