The Amazing Will Rogers

Will Rogers was one of the most popular men in America.  He was invited to be governor of Oklahoma.  He did agree to be Mayor of Beverly Hills.  His column in the New York Times reached 40 million readers. The US Post Office even created two stamps of him. As a Cherokee Indian cowboy he went a long way.

It is my opinion that we need men like him today, with his insight into politics, which he expressed in his own brand of humor.  If you would like to know more about this amazing man, do read the following brief expose of him that I have sent:

Will Rogers got his start with Texas Jack’s Wild West.

A Cherokee cowboy skilled in roping, Will Rogers became popular on stage in vaudeville shows and the Ziegfeld Follies.

He even performed before President Woodrow Wilson, roasting his political audience with hilariously witty remarks, which became his trademark:

• “The U.S. Senate opens with a prayer and closes with an investigation.”
• “If we got one-tenth of what was promised to us in these acceptance speeches there wouldn’t be any inducement to go to heaven.”
• “With Congress — every time they make a joke it’s a law. And every time they make a law it’s a joke.”

• “The short memories of American voters is what keeps our politicians in office.”
• “This country has come to feel the same when Congress is in session as when a baby gets hold of a hammer.”
• “Never blame a legislative body for not doing something. When they do nothing, that don’t hurt anybody. When they do something is when they become dangerous.”
• “Be thankful we’re not getting all the government we’re actually paying for.”

• “The budget is a mythical bean bag. Congress votes mythical beans into it, and then tries to reach in and pull real beans out.”
• “I don’t make jokes. I just watch the government and report the facts.”
• “If pro is the opposite of con, what is the opposite of Congress?”

• “If you ever injected truth into politics you’d have no politics.”
• “The trouble with practical jokes is that very often they get elected.”
• “Everything is changing. People are taking the comedians seriously and the politicians as a joke.”

In 1908, Will Rogers married Betty Blake, and together they had four children:

• Will Rogers, Jr., who became a WWII hero and was elected to Congress;
• Mary, who became a Broadway actress;
• James, who was a newspaperman, and
• Fred, who died at age two of diphtheria.

He had a large radio audience in the 1920’s and made 48 silent movies. When movies had sound, he appeared in 21 feature films.

One of his most notable roles was in Mark Twain’s A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court.

Rogers had a syndicated column, “Will Rogers says,” in the The York Times, which reached 40 million readers. He wrote frequently for The Saturday Evening Post.

Will Rogers stated:

• “There are two theories to arguing with a woman. Neither works.”
• “Always drink upstream from the herd.”
• “Everyone is ignorant, only on different subjects.”
• “There is nothing so stupid as the educated man if you get him off the thing he was educated in.”
• “The problem ain’t what people know. It’s what people know that ain’t so that’s the problem.”
• “The minute you read something that you can’t understand, you can almost be sure that it was drawn up by a lawyer.””
• “Hitler got his start in a beer hall and before he’s through he’ll give the world a hangover.”

Will Rogers commented on taxes:

• “The income tax has made liars out of more Americans than golf.”
• “I don’t want to complain, but every time they build a tax structure, the first thing they nail is me.”

• “The only difference between death and taxes is that death doesn’t get worse every time Congress meets.”
• “Next to guinea pigs, taxes have been the most prolific animal.”
• “The government shoves you in the creek once a year and all that don’t get wet you can keep.

Once, while entertaining polio victims and severely handicapped at the Milton H. Berry Institute in Los Angeles, he suddenly left the stage and rushed to the rest room. Milton Berry followed him to give him a towel, only to find him weeping like a child. In a few minutes, he was back on the platform, as jovial as before.

Will Rogers fundraised for the American Red Cross during the Great Depression, served as goodwill ambassador to Mexico, and briefly served as mayor of Beverly Hills. He was offered the nomination to be Oklahoma’s Governor, but he declined.

The State of Oklahoma placed a statue of Will Rogers in the U.S. Capitol’s Statuary Hall. Called the Cowboy Philosopher, where he said:

“The farmer has to be an optimist or he wouldn’t still be a farmer.”

“Even if you’re on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there.”

An advocate of aviation, he was friends with the famous pilots Charles Lindbergh and Wiley Post. Will Rogers flew with Wiley Post to Alaska, but getting caught in bad weather, they died in plane crash, August 15, 1935.

Oklahoma City named its international airport the Will Rogers World Airport.

The U.S. Post Office issued a stamp with Will Rogers image in 1948, and again in 1979.

With his cowboy philosopher wit, Rogers said: “The Lord constituted everybody that no matter what color you are, you require the same amount of nourishment.”

He remarked: “Live in such a way that you would not be ashamed to sell your parrot to the town gossip.”

Will Rogers quipped: “Lord, let me live until I die,”

And with great insight, the amazing and so popular Will Rogers finally said:

“The trouble with our praying is, we just do it as a means of last resort.”