William Penn Adair "Will" Rogers, 1879-1935
Will looked forward to the usual summer of free riding and twirling his rope. But the summer, that looked so promising at the beginning, was anything but that. First his two sisters had typhoid fever. Then Will came down with a severe case of measles. Then his mother became seriously ill and died.
Perhaps because of his mother's death, Will was not only careless in his studies the following school year in Tahlequah, but he also became careless in his personal care. This school also lasted only one year.
Finally he attended the Willie Halsell Institute at Vinita. Although he still hated the confining life of school, he was happier there and attended for four years. At the end of that time, when awards were given out, Will received an award for a recitation. Public speaking had always been one of his better subjects; no matter the topic he always made his audience laugh. What he said, the way he said it, the way he moved his eyes or his mouth–something was always funny.
During this time, Will's father invested in several businesses in town and was gone from the ranch most of the time. During the summers Will was left pretty much on his own, and roping and riding were still his main pursuits.
Then he spent a year Scarritt Collegiate Institute in Neosho, Missouri. He continued with his roping antics. He began his second year at the same school with one of the many ropes he had (and he had very many because school authorities had always kept taking them away). He happened to rope a teacher's colt. The colt bolted, ran through a tennis court, damaging it severely, and disappeared. Will was expelled.
Clem, at wit's end–or perhaps, since it involved Will, one should say "at the end of his rope"–sent Will to Kemper Military Academy, hoping the military discipline would turn the boy around. Will left his chaps at home, and donned the military attire of the school. He was not allowed to keep his horse, but the authorities did not have the foresight to also forbid his rope. Will found the uniform a wonderful costume for roping. But the rest of the setting was not to his taste, so the nineteen-year-old ran away.
He went to a friend's ranch in Texas. He tried to sign up for the Spanish-American War, but was told, "Son, we want men, not boys. We ain't looking to
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