Category: Yogi Berra

Yogi Berra? Apocryphal?

Dear Quote Investigator: Would you please explore another Yogiism? The following comical remark is attributed to the celebrated baseball player:

Never answer an anonymous letter.

If the letter contains no information about the sender then, of course, it is impossible to reply. That is the humorous interpretation. But Yogi Berra once noted that a letter may have a return address without providing a name.

Quote Investigator: The earliest evidence of a version of this quip located by QI was printed in 1876. The ascription to Yogi of the modern saying is uncertain. Detailed citations are given further below.

It is possible to reply to an anonymous letter sometimes. For example, an anonymous letter can be sent to a magazine, and the periodical can publish the letter together with a response. In 1770 an exchange of letters was published in “The Monthly Review” of London. One anonymous letter writer accused another writer of being overly personal. The journal published a response:^[1]1770 December, The Monthly Review; Or Literary Journal, Volume 43, Article 32: An Answer to a Second Letter to Dr. Priestley, Quote Page 492, Printed for R. Griffiths, London. (Google Books full … Continue reading

When, says he, I answer an anonymous letter, and make not the most distant allusion to any thing but what appears upon the face of it, where can be the personality?

In 1838 “Mechanics’ Magazine: Museum, Register, Journal, and Gazette” published an anonymous critical letter signed with a nom de plume. The journal also printed a response from the person who was criticized:^[2]1838 August 18, Mechanics’ Magazine: Museum, Register, Journal, and Gazette, Number 784, (Letter from L. Hebert, Camden Town, Date: August 11, 1838), Quote Page 328, Printed and Published for … Continue reading

It has been a rule with me never to answer an anonymous letter, but the classic pen of the reverend gentleman who signs himself “An Amateur Mechanic,” is as well known to me as if he had appeared in his proper person.

In 1873 a book titled “Analysis of Letter-Writing: With a Large Number of Examples of Model Business Letters” was released. The volume included the following two guidelines for proper business correspondence. No humor was intended:^[3]1873, Analysis of Letter-writing: With a Large Number of Examples of Model Business Letters by Calvin Townsend, Quote Page 139, Published by Ivison, Blakeman, Taylor, & Co., New York. (Google … Continue reading

All business letters should be carefully kept, until, at least, the matters to which they relate are completely closed, and there can be no further use for them.

You should never condescend to answer an anonymous letter, even if you are nearly certain who wrote it. Never write one.

By 1876 the comical potential of the line was recognized. A newspaper in Orange City, Iowa printed a collection of funny remarks under the article title “Nubbins of Humor” including these three items:^[4] 1876 November 9, Sioux County Herald, Nubbins of Humor, Quote Page 1, Column 7, Orange City, Iowa. (NewspaperArchive)

Intoxicating music—”Ale to the chief.”

It is a wise thing never to answer an anonymous letter until you have found out who wrote it.

“How long will my chop be, waiter?” asked a hungry man in a restaurant, “About five inches, sir.” was the prompt reply.

Here are additional selected citations in chronological order.

Continue reading Never Answer an Anonymous Letter

Yogi Berra? Apocryphal?

Dear Quote Investigator: Yogi Berra was a brilliant baseball player and manager. He is also famous for his comically wise sayings which are known as ‘Yogiisms’. This is my favorite on the topic of making decisions:

When you come to a fork in the road, take it.

Is this an authentic Yogiism?

Quote Investigator: This precise quotation was printed in the salient 1998 work “The Yogi Book: I Really Didn’t Say Everything I Said!”, and its author Yogi Berra provided some context for his statement:^[1] 1998, The Yogi Book: I Really Didn’t Say Everything I Said! by Yogi Berra, Page 48, Workman Publishing, New York. (Verified on paper)

I was giving Joe Garagiola directions from New York to our house in Montclair when I said this.

Garagiola was a long-time friend of Berra and a fellow baseball player.

Intriguingly, this same statement was used as part of a joke that was printed in several U.S. newspapers such as the “Fort Gibson New Era” of Gibson, Oklahoma and the “Correctionville News” of Correctionville, Iowa one hundred years ago in 1913. The humor was based on wordplay and referenced the additional meaning of ‘fork’ as a dining utensil:^[2] 1913 July 31, Fort Gibson New Era, Wise Directions (Filler item), Quote Page 2, Column 6, Fort Gibson, Oklahoma. (NewspaperArchive)^[3] 1913 July 31, Correctionville News, Wise Directions (Filler item), Quote Page 7, Column 6, Correctionville, Iowa. (NewspaperArchive)

Wise Directions

“When you come to a fork in the road, take it.”
“I will, if it is a silver one.”

Here are additional selected citations in chronological order.

Continue reading When You Come to a Fork in the Road, Take It

Yogi Berra? Apocryphal?

Dear Quote Investigator: Thanks for working to help clear up so many incorrect quotations and attributions. I have a question about a quote that might be suitable as the motto of your website. Yogi Berra supposedly said one the following Yogi-isms:

1. I really didn’t say everything I said.
2. I didn’t say everything I said.
3. I never said half the things I said.
4. Half the things I said, I never said them.
5. I never said most of the things I said.

Did Yogi say one of these statements?

Quote Investigator: In February 1986 there is good evidence that Yogi Berra did say the first statement above as recorded in a Long Island, New York newspaper:^[1]1986 February 24, Newsday (Nassau and Suffolk Edition), “Color Yogi a Happy Guy; Now wearing Astros’ rainbow uniform, Berra’s relaxed, popular” by Steve Marcus, Section … Continue reading

Berra was unveiled to the Southwest in the Astros’ winter caravan. “Here he was a Hall of Famer coming down to the backwoods of Texas,” publicist Rob Matwick said. “He was the most single sought-out person. He led the team in stares.”

Fans hung on Berra’s every word, hoping for a Berra-ism, many of which have been said by others but attributed to Yogi. “I really didn’t say everything I said,” Berra said, creating another original.

Here are additional selected citations in chronological order.

Continue reading I Really Didn’t Say Everything I Said

Yogi Berra? Paul Valéry? Laura Riding? Robert Graves? Anonymous?

Dear Quote Investigator: I am interested in a saying that is both humorous and shrewd:

The future is not what it used to be.

I have seen several other versions of the saying. The phrasing that uses the word “ain’t” is often credited to Yogi Berra:

The future ain’t what it used to be.
The future’s not what it was.
The future isn’t what it used to be.
The future is no longer what it used to be.

Who should be credited with this witty and sometimes rueful comment?

Quote Investigator: The baseball great Yogi Berra writing in his 1998 volume “The Yogi Book” did claim that he used this expression. A precise timeframe was not given, but the saying was accompanied with a picture from 1974. Yogi also offered an interpretation:^[1]1998, “The Yogi Book: I really didn’t say everything I said!” by Yogi Berra, Page 118 -119, Workman Publishing, New York. (Verified on paper)

I just meant that times are different. Not necessarily better or worse. Just different.

The earliest evidence of this saying located by QI was published in 1937 in a journal called “Epilogue” within an article titled “From a Private Correspondence on Reality” by Laura Riding and Robert Graves. The authors who were both prominent literary figures asserted that the perception of the future had changed:^[2]1937 Spring, Epilogue: A Critical Summary, Volume III, Journal edited by Laura Riding and Robert Graves, Article: “From a Private Correspondence on Reality” by Laura Riding and Robert … Continue reading

The human mind has reached the end of temporal progress: the future is not what it used to be, and people talk with less and less progenitive self-precipitation into the future, and behave with more and more fatally decisive immediacy. The future, that is, contains nothing but scientific development. It is an involuntary spending and manipulation of physical forces, empty of consciousness: it no longer matters.

Also in 1937 the poet and philosopher Paul Valéry wrote a version of the phrase in French in the essay “Notre Destin et Les Lettres”. In 1948 his words were translated and published in English in “Our Destiny and Literature” which was part of the collection “Reflections on the World Today”. Here is the French statement and the English translation with additional context:^[3] 2012, The Dictionary of Modern Proverbs, Compiled by Charles Clay Doyle, Wolfgang Mieder, and Fred R. Shapiro Page 90, Column 2, Yale University Press, New Haven.(Verified on paper)

L’avenir est comme le reste: il n’est plus ce qu’il était

The future, like everything else, is no longer quite what it used to be. By that I mean we can no longer think of it with any confidence in our inductions.

The above Valéry citation is listed in the important reference “The Dictionary of Modern Proverbs” from Yale University Press.

Here are additional selected citations in chronological order.

Continue reading The Future Is Not What It Used To Be

Yogi Berra? Apocryphal?

Dear Quote Investigator: While looking through a book of baseball’s greatest quotations I came across this hilarious reply from Yogi Berra to someone who criticized his appearance:

So I’m ugly. So what? I never saw anyone hit with his face.

Some of the sayings credited to Yogi are bogus, but I hope this one is real. What do you think?

Quote Investigator: There is good evidence starting in 1948 that Yogi did make this quip. The book “Yankee Doodles” by the sports writer Milton Gross contained a collection of profiles of New York Yankee baseball players. The chapter on Yogi contained the following:^[1] 1948, Yankee Doodles by Milton Gross, Chapter: Beauty’s Only Skin Deep, Start Page 109, Quote Page 115, House of Kent Publishing Company, Boston, Massachusetts. (Verified on paper)

Yogi may be many things to many people, but he’s not a dope. An amiable youngster, Yogi feels that when his teammates stop kidding him half the pleasure of life will be gone. When they remind him that he’s ugly, Yogi has a pat answer.

“It don’t matter if you’re ugly in this racket. All you have to do is hit the ball and I never saw anybody hit one with his face.”

In 1949 the popular magazine “Collier’s Weekly” published a profile of the ballplayer titled: “Yankee Yogi: I’m Human, Ain’t I?” by the journalist Gordon Manning. Yogi was quoted presenting a very similar quip with the word “anybody” replaced by “nobody”: ^[2]1949 August 13, Collier’s Weekly, Yankee Yogi: “I’m Human, Ain’t I?” by Gordon Manning, Start Page 21, Quote Page 21, The Crowell-Collier Publishing Company, … Continue reading

But Yogi, an amiable guy of twenty-four and the absolute favorite of everybody in the clubhouse, brushes off those who rib him about his ugliness.

“It don’t matter if you’re ugly in this racket,” he says. “All you gotta do is hit the ball, and I never saw nobody hit one with his face.”

Here are additional selected citations in chronological order.

Continue reading So I’m Ugly. So What? I Never Saw Anyone Hit with His Face

Yogi Berra? Apocryphal?

Dear Quote Investigator: One of the cleverest jokes credited to Yogi Berra is meta-logical. Apparently, some people were following Yogi around and expecting him to utter one of his famous Yogi-isms. Finally, in exasperation he said:

If I could just make ’em up on the spot, I’d be famous.

This response is great because it is a Yogi-ism. He did make it up on the spot, and he is famous for creating exactly this type of expression. But did this really happen?

Quote Investigator: There is good evidence that Yogi Berra did coin this Yogi-ism. In 2001 Yogi published the volume “When You Come to a Fork in the Road, Take It!” which was subtitled “Inspiration and Wisdom From One of Baseball’s Greatest Heroes”. He told of an episode that occurred at The Yogi Berra Museum & Learning Center which is on the campus of Montclair State University adjacent to the Yogi Berra Stadium:^[1] 2002 (Copyright 2001), “When You Come to a Fork in the Road, Take It!” by Yogi Berra with Dave Kaplan, Quote Page 138, Hyperion Paperback Edition, New York. (Amazon Look Inside)

People always expect me to be funny. I guess that’s the popular image. “Make up a Yogi-ism,” they’ll say. I can’t. I don’t think I ever said anything intentionally funny in my life. Sometimes the quotes just happen—I just don’t know when I’ll say them.

Once a couple visiting our museum met me and asked if I could say a Yogi-ism. I told them I don’t make them up on the spot. I said if I could, I’d be famous.

The same story was told in the pages of Sport Illustrated magazine in 2011. This version presented the words of Yogi as a direct quotation:^[2] 2011 July 04, Sports Illustrated, Where Are They Now?: Yogi Berra Will Be a Living Legend Even After He’s Gone by Joe Posnanski, (sportsillustrated.cnn.com; SI Vault; Accessed November 13, 2012)

Once a man and woman came up to him at the museum and asked him to invent a Yogi-ism, on the spot. He told them it doesn’t work that way. He does not just divine these phrases. He said, “If I could just make ’em up on the spot, I’d be famous.” The couple laughed happily. Yogi Berra did not know what was so funny.

In conclusion, based on the testimony of Yogi himself he did make this statement of self-referential wisdom.  Also, QI believes that it is unlikely that these words were said by someone else and then reassigned to Yogi.

(In Memoriam: Many thanks to my brother Stephen for pointing out the value of researching Yogi-isms.)

(Also, thanks to John for supplying the issue of Sports Illustrated.)