Quip City: Incisive Quotes & Intriguing Quirks about America and its Cities
Editorial Reviews
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"That's the most unrealistic thing about Northern Exposure. Skagway would not tolerate an obnoxious little jerk like [Rob Morrow's character Dr. Joel Fleischman]." - Skagway resident Scott Logan, quoted in the September 28, 1992 Atlanta Journal and Constitution
"Arizona doesn't observe daylight saving time because
there's no point in saving an hour of 112-degree daylight."
- Thomas Kunkel in a profile of Fife Symington, April 1997
George
"I cannot conceive of anything more ridiculous [than] that we are profiting by the acquisition of New Mexico and California. I hold that they are not worth a dollar." - Daniel Webster, speaking on the floor of the Senate in 1848; ten days after Mexico ceded California to the United States, gold was discovered at Sutter's Mill
"Everything worth photographing is in California." - photographer Edward Weston
"If Carmel's founders should return, they could not afford to live there, but it wouldn't go that far. They would be instantly picked up as suspicious characters and deported over the city line." - John Steinbeck, Travels with Charley
"Hollywood is a town where everyone wishes everyone else will fail, and if you die in the process, that's even better." - producer Jeffrey Katzenberg
"As a kid in Los Angeles, I grew up in a film-industry community, and it didn't have that Holy Grail appeal that it has for some people. I was there and I was not impressed." - Robert Redford
"Only in Oakland would a man get a standing ovation for stealing something." - unknown San Francisco Bay Area DJ, commenting on the crowd's reaction after baseball player Rickey Henderson stole his 939th base, breaking Lou Brock's record.
"Nobody trusts us. When the San Francisco Actors Theater applied for the rights to do Clare Boothe Luce's play, The Women, at the Zephyr Theater on Van Ness, the contract arrived from N.Y. with a message from Mrs. Luce specifying that all 35 female roles MUST be played by females!" - from Herb Caen's June 16, 1986 column
"Washington D.C. is full of people who think that if they don't do their job, the world will stop." - Robert Reich, Clinton Administration Secretary of Labor
"This is Dade County. If it's going to get weird, it's going to get weird here." - Metro-Dade police spokeswoman Linda O'Brien, when divers initially found little wreckage from ValuJet 592's crash site in the Everglades, May 1996
"You get up every day, and no matter how bad things are, it's a beautiful day. And the worst of Hawaii is so much better than where [constituents] came from. Politicians take advantage of people's good nature." - gubernatorial candidate Linda Lingle, speaking to columnist George Will about the challenge of changing the status quo in paradise, 2002
"Chicago got started when a bunch of people in New York said, ‘Gee, I'm enjoying the crime and the poverty, but it just isn't cold enough. Let's go west.'" - comedian Richard Jeni
"Being rude and killing someone are about on par here." - Roxanne Conlin, 1982 Democratic nominee for governor in Iowa
"Almost no one in New Orleans runs because they actually like running. We run so we can eat and drink and party that much more." - banker Colleen McEvoy
Good State for Trivia - Maine is the only state with a
one-syllable name and the only one that borders on just one
other state.
"Here in Boston we build computers that matter. Out in
Silicon Valley, they're just building video games." -
unnamed Digital Equipment Corp. executive, 1986
Strange Intervention - When Eugene O'Neill's Strange
Interlude debuted in Quincy in 1932, across the street from
the theater was a restaurant about to go bankrupt. But
theatergoers started to patronize the restaurant at
intermission, and the proprietor went on to open not only more
restaurants but a hotel chain as well. His name was Howard
Johnson.
"[Detroit] was always a cool city. I've always loved it, mostly because it's an underdog. And I've always rooted for underdogs." - comedian Tim Allen, a native of nearby Birmingham
"She never talked about Minnesota at all. I always thought she was from Hollywood." - actor Mickey Rooney on his teen-age co-star Judy Garland (born in Grand Rapids on June 10, 1922 at what is now 2727 U.S. Hwy. 169 South).
"God bless Nebraska - I love the state - but it's boring. There's not a lot to do, especially in wintertime." - North Bend native and actress Marg Helgenberger, quoted in the February 2002 Biography
"For a town that produced Henry Fonda, Marlon Brando, and Fred Astaire, I'm a sad commentary, I'll tell you." - investor Warren Buffett, quoted in the June 16, 1998 Omaha World-Herald
"Sinatra started Las Vegas. I guess Disney will finish it." - singer Robert Goulet
"It's in New Jersey? I hate New Jersey! I'm sorry they ever finished the George Washington Bridge." - Walter Matthau as Willy Clark in The Sunshine Boys
"Jim Kelly's contract with the Bills is for $7.5
million. That's $500,000 to play football and $7 million to
live in Buffalo." - Ralph Hasty, San Jose DJ
"For some New Yorkers, gall isn't a flaw but a lifestyle
choice, one of the seven habits of highly effective
people." - Peggy Noonan, discussing Hillary Clinton's
Senate campaign in the June 8, 1999 Wall Street Journal
"Rand McNally once accidentally left North Dakota out of
its road atlas and it took a few weeks for anyone to
notice." - travel writer and native Debora Halpern
Wenger, in the December 2, 2001 Tampa Tribune
"People in New York and Los Angeles want to have careers. People in Cleveland are happy to have jobs. I think more of America is like Cleveland." - Bruce Helford, producer of The Drew Carey Show
"Buckeyes football isn't a matter of life and death in Columbus - it's much more important than that." - from a profile of Ohio State football coach John Cooper, September 8, 1997 Sports Illustrated
"The streets are safe in Philadelphia - it's only the people who make them unsafe." - Mayor Frank Rizzo
"If they knew what they liked, they wouldn't live in Pittsburgh." - Joel McCrea as film director John L. Sullivan in Sullivan's Travels
"I'm going to Charleston. I want to see if somewhere there isn't something left in life of charm and grace." - Clark Gable as Rhett Butler in Gone With the Wind
"People in South Dakota used to wear T-shirts that said, ‘We have two seasons, shovel and swat.'" - actress and Huron native Cheryl Ladd
"If I owned both hell and Texas, I'd rent out Texas and live in hell." - General Philip Sheridan
"If you grew up anywhere in Texas and were kind of different, Austin would be the kind of place you'd gravitate to." - film director Richard Linklater, quoted in Fortune, November 23, 1998
"All Houston's good for is traffic, humidity, and a ship channel that catches on fire." - Dallas Cowboys fan Chad Jones, in the August 19, 2002 Sports Illustrated
"Let the word go forth at this time and place that Seattle is dark, ugly, rainy, unfriendly, and probably beyond saving." - columnist Emmett Watson, founder of the movement for Lesser Seattle, intended to thwart grand schemes of civic improvement
"We enclose and celebrate the freaks of our nation and of our civilization. Yellowstone National Park is no more representative of America than is Disneyland." - John Steinbeck, Travels with Charley
Quip City: Incisive Quotes & Intriguing Quirks about America and its Cities,Howard Baldwin,Robert D. Reed Publishers,1931741344,Anecdotes,Cities and towns,General,Humor,Miscellanea.,Quotations,Quotations, maxims, etc,Satire And Humor,Topic - Political,United States,sears
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