Author Rogers Will

n Rogers (1839–1911) and Mary America Schrimsher (1838–1890), were each of part Cherokee heritage, and Rogers himself was 9/32s Cherokee.[4] Rogers quipped that his ancestors didn't come over on the Mayflower but they "met the boat."[5] Clement Rogers was a distinguished figure in Indian Territory. A Cherokee senator and judge, he was a Confederate veteran and served as a delegate to the Oklahoma Constitutional Convention. Rogers County, Oklahoma is named in honor of Clement Rogers.[2] Mary Rogers was quarter-Cherokee and hereditary member of the Paint Clan.[6] She died when Will was 11, and his father remarried less than two years after her death.[7] Rogers was the youngest of his parents' eight children. He was named for the Cherokee leader Col. William Penn Adair.[8] Only three of his siblings, sisters Sallie Clementine, Maude Ethel, and May (Mary), survived into adulthood. The children attended Willow Hassel School in Neosho, Missouri, and later Kemper Military School in Boonville, Missouri. He ended his studies after the 10th grade. He admitted he was a poor student, saying that he "studied the Fourth Reader for ten years."[5] He was much more interested in cowboys and horses, and learned to rope and use a lariat. After ending his brief formal studies, Rogers worked the Dog Iron Ranch for a few years. Near the end of 1901, he and a friend left home with aspirations to work as gauchos in Argentina.[5] They made it to Argentina in May 1902, and spent five months trying to make it as ranch owners in the Argentine pampas. Unfortunately, Rogers and his partner lost all their money, and in his words, "I was ashamed to send home for more," so the two friends separated and Rogers sailed for South Africa. It is often claimed he took a job breaking in horses for the British Army, but the Boer War had ended three months earlier.[9] Rogers actually got work at Piccione's ranch in Mooi River Station.[10] When the war ended and the British Army no longer required his service, he began his show business career as a trick roper in "Texas Jack's Wild West Circus": He (Texas Jack) had a little Wild West aggregation that visited the camps and did a tremendous business. I did some roping and riding, and Jack, who was one of the smartest showmen I ever knew, took a great interest in me. It was he who gave me the idea for my original stage act with my pony. I learned a lot about the show business from him. He could do a bum act with a rope that an ordinary man couldn't get away with, and make the audience think it was great, so I used to study him by the hour, and from him I learned the great secret of the show business—knowing when to get off. It's the fellow who knows when to quit that the audience wants more of.[9] Grateful for the guidance but anxious to move on, Rogers quit the circus and went to Australia. Texas Jack gave him a reference letter for the Wirth Brothers Circus there, and Rogers continued to perform as a rider and trick roper, and worked on his pony act. He returned to the United States in 1904, and began to try his roping skills on the American vaudeville circuits. On a trip to New York City, Rogers was at Madison Square Garden when a wild steer broke out of the arena and began to climb into the viewing stands. Rogers quickly roped the steer to the delight of the crowd. The feat got front page attention from the newspapers, giving him valuable publicity and an audience eager to see more. William Hammerstein came to see his vaudeville act, and quickly signed Rogers to appear on the Victoria Roof—which was literally on a rooftop—with his pony. For the next decade, Rogers estimated he worked for fifty weeks a year at the Roof and at the city's myriad vaudeville theaters.[9] In 1908, Rogers married Betty Blake, and the couple had four children: Will Rogers, Jr. (Bill), Mary Amelia (Mary), James Blake (Jim), and Fred Stone. Bill became a World War II hero, played his father in two films, and became a member of Congress. Mary became a Broadway actress, and Jim was a newspaperman and rancher; Fred died of diphtheria at age two.[3] The family lived in New York, but they managed to make it home to Oklahoma during the summers. In 1911, Rogers bought a 20-acre (8.1 hectare) ranch near Claremore, Oklahoma, which he intended to use as his retirement home, for US$500 per acre.[3] In the fall of 1915, Rogers began to appear in Florenz Ziegfeld's Midnight Frolic. The variety revue began at midnight in the top-floor night club of Ziegfeld's New Amsterdam Theatre, and drew many influential—and regular—customers. By this time, Rogers had refined his act to a science. His monologues on the news of the day followed a similar routine every night. He appeared on stage in his cowboy outfit, nonchalantly twirling his lasso, and said, "Well, what shall I talk about? I ain't got anything funny to say. All I know is what I read in the papers." He then made jokes about what he had read in that day's newspapers. The line "All I know is what I read in the papers" is often incorrectly described as Rogers's most famous punch line, when it was in fact his opening line. His run at the New Amsterdam ran on into 1916, and Rogers's obvious popularity led to an engagement on the more famous Ziegfeld Follies. Ziegfeld saw comedians as mere 'stage-fillers' who entertained the audience while the stage was reset for the next spectacle of beautiful girls in stunning costumes. Rogers managed to not only hold his own, but achieved star status, with both his roping and his precise satire on the daily news. An editorial in the The New York Times said that "Will Rogers in the Follies is carrying on the tradition of Aristophanes, and not unworthily."[11] Rogers branched into silent films too, for Samuel Goldwyn's company Goldwyn Pictures. He made his first silent movie, Laughing Bill Hyde, filmed in Fort Lee, New Jersey, in 1918. Many early films were made near the major New York performing market, so Rogers could make the film, yet still rehearse and perform in the Follies. He eventually appeared in most of the Follies from 1916 to 1925. Rogers and his young family moved permanently to the West Coast in 1919, when Goldwyn Pictures moved to join the rise of filmmaking in California.[12] During the same period of time Rogers made 12 silent movies for Goldwyn, until his contract ended in 1921, he was also making the Illiterate Digest film-strip series for the Gaumont Film Company. While Rogers enjoyed film acting, his appearances in silent movies suffered from the obvious restrictions of silence—not the strongest medium for him, having gained his fame as a commentator on stage. It helped somewhat that he wrote a good many of the title cards appearing in his films. In 1923, he began a one-year stint for Hal Roach and made 12 pictures. He made two other feature silents and a travelogue series in 1927, and did not return to the screen until his time in the 'talkies' began in 1929. From 1929 to 1935, Rogers became the star of the Fox Film lot (now 20th Century Fox). Far from being a "B-Movie" level performer, Rogers appeared in 21 feature films alongside such noted performers as Lew Ayres, Billie Burke, Richard Cromwell, Jane Darwell, Andy Devine, Janet Gaynor, Rochelle Hudson, Boris Karloff, Myrna Loy, Joel McCrea, Hattie McDaniel, Ray Milland, Maureen O'Sullivan, ZaSu Pitts, Dick Powell, Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, Mickey Rooney, and Peggy Wood. He was directed three times by John Ford. He appeared in three films with his friend Stepin Fetchit (aka Lincoln T. Perry), David Harum (1934), Judge Priest (1934) and The County Chairman (1935).[13] With his voice becoming increasingly familiar to audiences, he was able to basically play himself, without normal makeup, in each film, managing to ad-lib and even work in his familiar commentaries on politics at times. The clean moral tone of his films led to various public schools taking their classes, during the school day, to attend special showings of some of them. His most unusual role may have been in the first talking version of Mark Twain's novel A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court. His popularity soared to new heights with films including Young As You Feel, Judge Priest, and Life Begins at 40 with Richard Cromwell and Rochelle Hudson. Rogers began a weekly column, titled "Slipping the Lariat Over," at the end of 1922.[14] He had already published a book of wisecracks and had begun a steady stream of humor books.[5] Through the continuing series of columns for the McNaught Syndicate between 1922 and 1935, as well as in his personal appearances and radio broadcasts, he won the loving admiration of the American people, poking jibes in witty ways at the issues of the day and prominent people—often politicians. He wrote from a non-partisan point of view and became a friend of presidents and a confidant of the great. Loved for his cool mind and warm heart, he was often considered the successor to such greats as Artemus Ward and Mark Twain. Rogers was not the first entertainer to use political humor before his audience. Others such as Broadway comedian Raymond Hitchcock and Britain's Sir Harry Lauder precede him by several years. The legendary Bob Hope is the best known political humorist to follow Rogers's example.