A Rare Recording of Will Rogers

The following recordings include Will Rogers a comedic keynote speech to a collection of bankers in 1924 and his first political speech made in support of a New York candidate for Congress. William Penn Adair Rogers (November 4, 1879 - August 15, 1935) was an American stage and film actor, vaudeville performer, humorist, and newspaper columnist from Oklahoma. Born in Cherokee Nation territory, Rogers was known as "Oklahoma's Favorite Son." Rogers traveled the world, made 71 films (50 silent films and 21 "talkies"), and wrote more than 4,000 nationally syndicated newspaper columns. By the mid-1930s Rogers was hugely popular in the United States as its leading political commentator and the highest paid Hollywood film star. He died in 1935 with aviator Wiley Post when their small airplane crashed in northern Alaska.