Character
One historian sums up Longworth: "Debonair and aristocratic, given to wearing spats and carrying a gold-headed cane, he was anything but a typical politician. He was perpetually cheerful, quick with a joke or witty retort, and unfailingly friendly. He seemed never to have a care and made hard decisions with such ease and detachment that some people wondered if anything at all really mattered to him."
One particular famous retort is told about Longworth. One day, while lounging in a chair at the Capitol, another member of the House ran his hand over Longworth's bald pate and commented, "Nice and smooth. Feels just like my wife's bottom." Longworth felt his own head and returned an answer: "Yes, so it does."
Read more about this topic: Nicholas Longworth
Famous quotes containing the word character:
“Character repudiates intellect, yet excites it; and character passes into thought, is published so, and then is ashamed before new flashes of moral worth.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Have you not budged an inch, then? Such is the daily news. Its facts appear to float in the atmosphere.... We should wash ourselves clean of such news. Of what consequence, though our planet explode, if there is no character involved in the explosion? In health we have not the least curiosity about such events. We do not live for idle amusement. I would not run round a corner to see the world blow up.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“You can tell a lot about a fellow’s character by his way of eating jelly beans.”
—Ronald Reagan (b. 1911)