# Must Hate Dogs (and Little Children)

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/must-hate-dogs-and-little-children/389109>\
**Category:** Cafe Society\
**Created:** [January 23, 2007, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/must-hate-dogs-and-little-children/389109 "2007-01-23T16:31:04Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\
**Post date:** [January 23, 2007, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/must-hate-dogs-and-little-children/389109/1 "2007-01-23T16:31:04Z")

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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 H_Y_M_A_N K_A_P_L_A_N\* 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.