on Will Rogers:
- “…Will can’t help being funny no matter where he happens to be. His humor isn’t the artificial kind that you can put on and take off like a coat. He’s just himself. He’s always himself. He doesn’t try to be funny. He just is.”
— Betty, Will Rogers’ wife. - “I think that is a most important ingredient in Will Rogers’ humor-reality. Unlike most humorists, he seldom told ‘tall tales’ about how-the-roof-fell-in-when-cousin-Zeb-was-sparkin’-in-the-parlor-and-the-bull-climbed-in-the-second-story-window-when-the-fire-department-arrived. When Will Rogers tells a story . . . the details may wander around a bit, but the basic events are as they actually occurred. He invented the gags, never the situation.”
— from Will Rogers, Jr.’s preface to Will Rogers’ Ether and Me. - “He was a compassionate man; he was always pleasant, he was always kindly. That is the key word–kindly!”– actress Peggy Wood.’
- “He was unique. Will Rogers had a way of slapping you, while he picked you up. That is a great art, and Rogers certainly was great.”– actor Lew Ayres.
- “His humor and his comments were always kind. His was no biting sarcasm that hurt the highest or the lowest of his fellow citizens. When he wanted people to laugh out loud, he used the methods of pure fun. And when he wanted to make a point for the good of mankind, he used the kind of gentle irony that left no scars behind it.”– President Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
By Will Rogers:
- “The movies are the only business where you can go out front and applaud yourself.”
- “There is only one thing that can kill the movies, and that is education.”
- “I’m not a real movie star. I still got the same wife I started out with nearly 28 years ago.”
- “Old Hollywood is just like a desert water in Africa. Hang around long enough and every kind of animal in the world will drift in for refreshments.”
“I belong to no organized party. I am a Democrat.” - “On account of being a democracy and run by the people, we are the only nation in the world that has to keep a government four years, no matter what it does.”
- “There ought to be one day-just one-when there is open season on senators.”
- “There’s no trick to being a humorist when you have the whole government working for you.”
- “You can’t say that civilization don’t advance, however, for in every war they kill you in a new way.”
- “I don’t make jokes. I just watch the government and report the facts.”
- “The man with the best job in the country is the vice President. All he has to do is get up every morning and say, ‘How’s the President?'”
- “I don’t care how poor and inefficient a little country is; they like to run their own business. I know men that would make my wife a better husband than I am, but, darn it, I’m not going to give her to ’em.”
- “The United States investigates everything-usually after it’s dead.”