The E. E. Cummings Society and its Journal, SPRING were established in New York City in 1980 by David V. Forrest, a psychiatrist, and Richard S. Kennedy and Norman Friedman, both English professors. Friedman and Forrest, along with Editorial Board members George J. Firmage and D. Jon Grossman, knew Cummings in the old days and enjoyed a personal / literary relationship with him.