I've always believed in the adage that the secret of eternal youth is arrested development.

I have a simple philosophy. Fill what's empty. Empty what's full. And scratch where it itches.

Alice Roosevelt Longworth (12 February 1884 – 20 February 1980) was the only daughter of Theodore Roosevelt, the 26th President of the United States, and his first wife, Alice Hathaway Lee.

Quotes

• He looks as though he's been weaned on a pickle.
  • On Calvin Coolidge, as quoted in The Washington Post (21 October 1924).

• The little man on the wedding cake.
  • Describing Thomas E. Dewey, Harry S. Truman's Republican opponent, as quoted in The Washington Post (22 May 1951); also attributed to Walter Winchell.

• If you can't say something good about someone, sit right here by me.
  • As quoted in TIME (9 December 1966) - photograph of her with a pillow bearing the quotation
  • Variants:
  • If you haven't anything nice to say about anybody, come sit next to me.
  • If you haven't something good to say about someone sit right here by me.

• I have a simple philosophy. Fill what's empty. Empty what's full. And scratch where it itches.
  • As quoted in The Best (1974), edited by Peter Passell and Leonard Ross.

• I've always believed in the adage that the secret of eternal youth is arrested development.
  • As quoted in Alice, The Life and Times of Alice Roosevelt Longworth (1979) by Howard Teichmann, p. 237.

• I valued my independence from an early age and was always something of a individualist … Well, a show-off anyway.
  • As quoted in "The Doyenne of the Drawing Room" in The New York Times (23 August 1981).

Quotes about Longworth

• I can be President of the United States, or I can control Alice. I cannot possibly do both.
  • Theodore Roosevelt, in response when a dignitary asked if he could better control his daughter, as quoted in Hail to the Chiefs : My Life and Times with Six Presidents (1970) by Ruth Shick Montgomery, and TIME magazine (3 March 1980).

External links

• New York Times book review of Conversations with Mrs. L (August 1981)
• Almanac of Theodore Roosevelt : Alice Roosevelt Longworth
• Find-a-Grave