Must Hate Dogs (and Little Children)

[Exapno_Mapcase]

Any man who hates dogs and little children can’t be all bad.

No, W. C. Fields never said that. It was said about him at a tribute dinner in 1943. By Dr. Leo C. Rosten, a sociologist who had just written the first serious book on Hollywood. He later became better known as the Leo C. Rosten who wrote the utterly brilliant The Education of HYMAN KAPLAN* and classics like Captain Newman M.D. And The Joys of Yiddish, which is in its own category.

Everybody who is anybody knows that the Fields quote is his. The rest… Well, I can’t find the old thread, but we once had a brouhaha because somebody couldn’t believe that Rosten said this and wanted proof, which I couldn’t provide definitively at the time.

Now? A different story.

How about somebody who attended the dinner and reported on it contemporaneously? Will that do?

I present humorist H. Allen Smith and his 1944 copyright Lost in the Horse Latitudes.

And now, [the toastmaster] said, “just one more speaker and we’ll call it a night. It is my pleasure, gentlemen, to present you with Dr. Leo C. Rosten, who has a few remarks.”
…
He stood up and said:
“It is my opinion that any man who hates dogs and little children can’t be all bad.”

Then he sat down and the newspapermen emerged from their torpor and cheered him as if he had just announced the death of Hitler.

Let’s hope that settles it and gives Rosten the credit among us cognoscenti where it is due.