Will Rogers

“ Now what made this One Hundred and Ten Pounds (half portion of physical manhood) beloved by not only the racing Public but by the masses who never bet a cent on a Horse race in their lives? The same thing that will make a man great in any line—his absolute HONESTY. The racing public are very fickle and when they lose they are apt to lay blame on almost any quarter. But win or lose, they knew it was not Sande. ”

“ But as for me being too Dumb to get the idea of “the Soup plate being tipped away and not toward one,” that’s not Etiquette; that’s just Self Protection. As bad as you plate tippers want all you can get, you don’t want it in your lap. Custom makes manners, and while I know that it is permissible to tip plates, I still say that it is not a universal custom. Manners are nothing more than common sense, and a person has no more right to try and get every drop of soup out of his plate than he has to take a piece of bread and try and harvest all the Gravy in his plate. ”

“ The way to judge a good Comedy is by how long it will last and have people talk about it. Now Congress has turned out some that have lived for years and people are still laughing about them, and as for Sad productions, they have turned out some that for sadness make “Over the Hills” look like a roaring farce.
Girls win a little State Popularity Contest that is conducted by some Newspaper; then they are put into the Movies to entertain 110 million people who they never saw or know anything about. Now that’s the same way with the Capitol Comedy Company of Washington. ”

“ Of the three things to prevent wars, League of Nations, International Court, and this Drafting of Capital, this last one is so far ahead of the others there is no comparison. When that Wall Street Millionaire knows that you are not only going to come into his office and take his Secretary and Clerks but that you come in to get his Dough, say Boy, there wouldn’t be any war. You will hear the question: “Yes, but how could you do it?”
Say, you take a Boy’s life, don’t you? When you take Boys away you take everything they have in the World, that is, their life. ”

“ Well, it seems like a Coincidence that, as I was trying to say something in a serious way for the first time before a New York Audience, why, away out in Butte, Montana, the best friend I have was going up to a Minister with a Bible in his hand and asking him if he didn’t think “the Lord would recognize a Comedian.”
So that is why you will get this Story and no jokes today.
Now a great many people, knowing my regard and friendship for Fred Stone, asked me if I was surprised. No, I was not. It was the shortest jump, from his life to a religious one, that any man ever made. ”

“ Lincoln made a wonderful speech under similar conditions one time: “That this Nation under God, shall have a new Birth of Freedom, and that Government of the people, by the People, for the People, shall not perish from this earth.”
Now, every time a Politician gets in a speech, he digs up this Gettysburg quotation. He recites it every Decoration day and practices the opposite the other 364 days.
If our Government is by the people, how is it the Candidate with the most votes by the people, going into a Presidential Convention never got nominated? ”

“ What do you suppose he could have gotten out of some bunch of betting Crooks to have pulled Zev in the big International Race? Why, enough to retire on and never have to take another chance with his Life by riding. He could have done it on the back stretch and no one would have ever known.
Ability is all right but if it is not backed up by Honesty and Public confidence you will never be a Sande. A man that don’t love a Horse, there is something the matter with him. If he has no sympathy for the man that does love Horses then there is something worse the matter with him. ”

“ You know the more you read and observe about this Politics thing, you got to admit that each party is worse than the other. The one that’s out always looks the best. ”

“ There can be no Profiteering. The Government owns everything till the war is over. Every Man, Woman and Child, from Henry Ford and John D. down, get their Dollar and a Quarter a day the same as the Soldier. The only way a man could profiteer in war like that would be to raise more Children.
If any man went before the People on a platform of that kind and put it over, he could remain President till his Whiskers got so long he could make a fortune just picking the lost Golf Balls out of them. ”

“ Well, I have just this minute returned from Tia Juana, Mexico, where I along with some thousands of other Scientists went to observe the Total Eclipse. That is that was their excuse for going. You know it don’t take much excuse to get a man, or Woman either, to go to Mexico nowadays. So when the Scientists said that Los Angeles was only to get a 99 percent Eclipse, (That is about the only thing I ever knew Los Angeles to fall down on. They are generally 100 percent) it kinder hurt their pride. It was the first time that Nature had ever handed them a mere 99. ”

“ Now I am not going to tell you any jokes today as jokes are not good for you to read every day. You will have to look to the Washington dispatches from Congress for your humor.
A Comedian is not supposed to be serious nor to know much. As long as he is silly enough to get laughs, why, people let it go at that. But I claim you have to have a serious streak in you or you can’t see the funny side in the other fellow. Last Sunday night a Young Girl who had made a big hit in the Salvation Army preaching on the Street in New York, decided to go out and give religious Lectures of her own. ”

“ How many thousands of People in every line come to New York every year that want to make good, get ahead and be recognized! They come by the millions. How many, if anything happened to them, would get even a passing Notice in the busy and overcrowded New York Press. If some Millionaire died, the best he could get would be a column. ”

“ Now, at the present time, there is every night in the front row a Millionaire Oklahoma Oil Magnate and a Bootlegger, both angling for the same Corporation. If this Bootlegging person lands her, why her Stockholders are made for life, but if the Oil Magnate comes through (for sometimes these female Corporations are swayed by sentiment) , why the stock won’t be worth within a thousand Percent of what it will be if the Bootheel Party lands. ”

“ I am always nervous. I never saw an Audience that I ever faced with any confidence. For no man can ever tell how a given Audience will ever take anything.
But here I was, nothing but a very ordinary Oklahoma Cowpuncher who had learned to spin a Rope a little and who had learned to read the Daily Papers a little, going out before the Aristocracy of Baltimore, and the President of the United States, and kid about some of the Policies with which he was shaping the Destinies of Nations. ”

“ Who would be the most beneficial to mankind, the man who invented Chewing Gum, or me who can find a use for it? Why, say, if I can take a wad of old Gum and graft it onto some other substance, I will be the modern Burbank. (With the ideas I have got for used Gum I may be honored by my Native State of Oklahoma by being made Governor, with the impeachment clause scratched out of the Contract.) ”

“ When you visit a friend’s newly finished Home you will be shown through all the Bath rooms, but when you leave you couldn’t, to save your soul, tell [Pg 143] where the dining room was. They seem to kinder want to camouflage or hide that nowadays. There is such little eating being done in the Homes now that a dining room is almost a lost art. Breakfast is being served in bed, Dinner at the Cabaret with dancing attached, and Lunch—no up-to-date Man would think of going anywhere but to his Clubs for lunch. ”

“ We will never have true civilization until we have learned to recognize the rights of others. ”

“ A Writer calls himself a Literary Man or an Artist. There are thousands of them, and all, simply because they write, are termed Artists. Is there a Sande among them? Caruso was great, but he had only to show ability. He didn’t have to demonstrate any honesty. Nobody tried to keep him from singing his best by bribery.
[Pg 339]
Now if you think the Racing Public and millions of well wishers are hoping for this Kid’s recovery, what about the Horses? They knew him better than the Humans did. Why, that Horse would have broke his own neck rather than hurt Sande. ”

“ Income Tax has made more Liars out of the American people than Golf has.
Even when you make one out on the level, you don’t know when it’s through if you are a Crook or a Martyr.
Of course, people are getting smarter nowadays; they are letting Lawyers, instead of their conscience, be their Guide. ”

“ Now everything is funny as long as it is happening to somebody Else, but when it happens to you, why it seems to lose some of its Humor, and if it keeps on happening, why the entire laughter kinder Fades out of it. ”

“ Well, New Years is coming and I suppose we will have to hear and read all those big men’s New Year greetings, such men as Schwab and Gary and Rockefeller and all of them. Saying the same old Apple Sauce. That they are Optimistic of the coming year and everybody must put their shoulder to the wheel, and produce more and they predict a great year. Say, if we had those Birds’ Dough we could all be just as optimistic as they are. But it’s a good Joke and it’s got in the papers every year and I suppose always will.
Now the Ku Klux is coming into New York and kinder got it in for the Jewish People. ”

“ These Corset Builders, while they might not do a whole lot to help civilization, are a tremendous aid [Pg 41] to the Eyesight. They have got what you would call a Herculean task as they really have to improve on nature. The same problem confronts them that does the people that run the Subways in New York City. They both have to get so many pounds of human flesh into a given radius. The subway does it by having strong men to push and shove until they can just close the door with only the last man’s foot out. But the Corset Carpenters arrive at the same thing by a series of strings. ”

“ I don’t claim mine to be better or worse than any other. But get with somebody and try and do better.” Hunt out and talk about the good that is in the other fellow’s Church, not the bad, and you will do away with all this religious hatred you hear so much of nowadays. Then you will not only have one Fred Stone but Millions of them.
Besides, it’s not that we need more people just to join Churches. It’s that we need more Fred Stones, either in or out of a Church. For this Man’s life is an object lesson to every Young Man or Boy starting out on a career in any line of business. ”

“ We can always depend on Judge Gary for a weekly laugh in his speeches. But lately he had the prize wheeze of his career. He had his accomplices make an investigation of the Steel Industry, and they turned in a report that it was much more beneficial to man to work 12 hours a day than 8. They made this report so alluring that it is apt to make people who read it decide to stay the extra 4 hours on their jobs, just through the Health and enjoyment they get out of it. ”

“ All are being trained for a Stage career. So you see he don’t think so bad of the Stage.
He is the best loved Actor on the Stage today. He plays to the highest type audience of any Musical Show. He is the only Musical comedy comedian that has Matinees packed with Children, for none of our other Musical Comedy Comedians has ever been able to please the Children and the grown ups too. He is as great a Pantomimist on the stage as Chaplin is on the screen. ”

“ In a Real Estate man’s eye, the most exclusive part of the City is wherever he has a House to sell. ”

“ The quicker the Authors write them the quicker they can get to some useful work. But if Pascal were on earth today and heard of that feat he would say: “That’s fine, Professor, but what did you do with the other 10 Hours?”
It takes two and a half Tons of Marks to buy a Stein of Beer in Berlin. Before the War you could have bought two and a half Tons of Beer for a Mark. What does Wall Street think of that? It shows you that selfish Interests can’t rule the People, when they make up their mind to rebel. ”

“ Ford will have that he don’t belong to either Party. It’s getting so if a man wants to stand well socially he can’t afford to be seen with either the Democrats or the Republicans.
I expect, if it was left to a vote right now by all the people, Mr. Ford would be voted for by more people than any other man. But, if it come to a question of counting those votes, I doubt if he even run third. ”

“ It’s a bigger thing for Washington than the Shriners’ Convention, because it has all of them, besides a lot more.
[Pg 224]
If they would all tell the truth the first time they testify they wouldn’t have to testify again like they are doing now, and they would get the thing over a lot quicker. They ought to pass a rule in this Country that in any investigations, if a Man couldn’t tell the truth the first time he shouldn’t be allowed to try again.
Now we have another Scandal in the Veterans’ Bureau. But we are just in such shape that we can’t take care of but one Scandal at a time. ”

“ As I am writing this away out here in California days before you read it, it’s Sunday and everybody’s thoughts and sympathies are with a train rushing clear across our Country, passing sorrowfully through little Towns with Just Folks standing bareheaded paying their respects to Just Folks going back to Marion to stay with Just Folks.
He goes to his resting place a Martyr, a martyr to the Boneheadedness of Reception Committees. You wouldn’t ask your hired man to do in one week the amount of real physical work that each Committee asked him to do on one day. ”

“ Fred Stone can do more things and do them well than any man in or out of the Show Business or the Movies.
Why can he?
He is 49 years old and has spent 45 years practicing. Now, we have not another man in America that has done that. He started at 4 or 5 years of age and has worked on new stunts every day of his [Pg 210] life and still does. He always wanted to have something new for the people every year. We have performers that have specialized on one thing that are great, but not a one that can do the variety of things that he can. ”

“ Even the People in them hate ’em. The most popular joke I had after the War in New York when the Boys were coming back and parading every day was, “If we really wanted to honor our Boys, why didn’t we let them sit on the reviewing stands and make the people march those 15 miles?” They didn’t want to parade, they wanted to go home and rest. But they wouldn’t discharge a Soldier as long as they could find a new Street in a Town that he hadn’t marched down, yet.
Of course, keep Circus Parades, for they really give enjoyment not only to kids but us old ones, too. ”

“ When you consider that the biggest and highest salaried and busiest Man we have in our profession can stop and give some of his time to religion, it is a lesson to the rest of us. Now, it has been my good fortune to have been very close friends with Fred for years. I have lived in his home and spend all my spare time there while playing in New York. We Rope and Ride and play together all the time. He has two wonderful homes on Long Island, one all fixed up like a Western Ranch with lots of Horses and a Polo field of his own on his place. ”

“ It’s not the high cost of Living that is driving us to the Poor House,—It’s the high Cost of bathing. The big question today is not what are you going to pay for your plot of ground, but what kind of fixtures are you going to put in your legion of Bath Rooms. Manufacturers of Porcelain and Tile have Supplanted the Pocket Flask as our principal commodity.
The interest on unpaid-for Bath Rooms would pay our National Debt. ”

“ They would resemble a lot of plate jugglers instead of Dinner Guests. Why if that was the universal custom, I would invent a triangle shape slide that could be pushed under the plate, so it would permit you to have one hand free, in case you were sitting next to your own wife, or if by chance you might want to use your napkin. According to your hungry plan, every Guest practically handcuffs himself during the latter end of the soup course. He is absolutely helpless. So don’t ask head waiters and stewards what to do, Percy, look around yourself. ”