May 16

"No man will ever be President of the United States who spells Negro with two Gs."

William Seward
(05/16/1801 – 10/10/1872)
US Secretary of State

"That nonchalant attempt of Eve's
to fashion garments from leaves
was not, as you have heard, inspired
by shame at being unattired."

Mrs. Harry St. Clair Zogbaum (Leola Baird Leonard)
(05/16/1888 – ??/??/1941)
US writer

"I can understand that memory must be selective, else it would choke on the glut of experience. What I cannot understand is why it selects what it does."

Virgilia Peterson
(05/16/1904 – ??/??/1964)
US writer

"I've been close to Bette Davis for thirty-eight years—and I have the cigarette burns to prove it."

Henry Fonda
(05/16/1905 – 08/12/1982)
US actor (father of Jane and Peter, grandfather of Bridget)

"John Gielgud is so camp! When he took home the Oscar for 'Arthur,' he said, 'Just what I've always wanted—a naked man in my rumpus room.'"

Liberace
(05/16/1919 – 02/04/1987)
Hungarian-US pianist

"It's exhilarating to be alive in a time of awakening consciousness; it can also be confusing, disorienting, and painful."

Adrienne Rich
(05/16/1929 – )
US writer

"If it wasn't for [pimps, prostitutes, hustlers, gangsters, and gamblers] there wouldn't be no jazz! They supported the club owners who bought the music. It wasn't the middle-class people who said 'Let's go hear Charlie Parker tonight.'"

Betty Carter
(05/16/1929 – 09/26/1998)
US singer

"After being Turned Down by numerous Publishers, he had decided to write for Posterity."

George Ade
(02/09/1866 – 05/16/1944)
US humorist

"Music is the wine that fills the cup of silence."

Robert Fripp
(05/16/1946 – )
English guitarist (King Crimson, etc.) photo courtesy of Greg Kugel

"When Solomon said that there was a time and a place for everything he had not encountered the problem of parking an automobile."

Bob Edwards
(05/16/1947 – )
US TV host

"I don't see myself as the Hunk of the Month."

Pierce Brosnan
(05/16/1953 – )
Irish actor

"I have a thing with the camera. The lens is unconditional. It doesn't judge you."

Debra Winger
(05/16/1955 – )
US actor

"All over Alabama the lamps are out—Let Us Now Praise Famous Men."

James Agee
(11/27/1909 – 05/16/1955)
US writer, critic, and frequent crossword puzzle answer

Howard Stern: "What is the capital of New York?"
Tori Spelling: "...New Jersey?"
(05/16/1973 – )
US actor

"A man may be a tough, concentrated, successful money-maker and never contribute to his country anything more than a horrible example."

Sir Robert Menzies
(12/20/1894 – 05/16/1978)
Australian PM

"I cringe when critics say I'm a master of the popular novel. What's an unpopular novel?"

Irwin Shaw
(02/27/1913 – 05/16/1984)
US writer

"If they hadn't thrown me off, I would've been the star!"

Andy Kaufman
(01/17/1949 – 05/16/1984)
US comic, actor , as "Tony Clifton"

"It isn't easy being green."

Kermit the Frog (Jim Henson)
(09/24/1936 – 05/16/1990)
US entertainer

"Being a star has made it possible for me to get insulted in places where the average Negro could never hope to get insulted."

Sammy Davis, Jr.
(12/08/1925 – 05/16/1990)
US entertainer

"The world I create in the writing compensates for what the real world does not give me."

Gloria Evangelina Anzaldua
(09/26/1942 – 05/16/2004)
US-Chicana writer