“Hats off to Will”

Will Rogers Birthday Tribute and Wreath Laying Ceremony

The Indian Women’s Pocahontas Club’s “Hats Off to Will” annual commemorative birthdate tribute and celebration of Will Rogers’ life and legacy will be Saturday, October 31, noon to 2 p.m. at the Will Rogers Memorial Museum, 1720 West Will Rogers Blvd.The public is invited to this free event which will start immediately following the Will Rogers Parade through downtown Claremore. Admission to the museum will be waived for event attendees (donations accepted). The event features Will's favorite lunch.

The Hats Off to Will program is a tradition of the Pocahontas Club membership. They will be wearing their traditional Cherokee tear dresses, ribbon skirts of many colors and red shawls, as they honor Rogers as a Cherokee citizen, Oklahoma’s Favorite Son and a charter member of their organization which was established in 1899.

The Hats Off to Will Program 


Noon - The formal Wreath Laying Ceremony at the Tomb of Will Rogers’ family tomb will include the Presentation of The Colors presented by the Cherokee Nation Veterans Color Guard followed by a flute tribute by Heather Neugin, Miss Cherokee 2025-2026.

12:30 p.m. – Speakers and Entertainment in the Will Rogers Theatre include performances by Hall of Fame Fiddler Jana Jae and emerging Cherokee musician Michael Thompson, Cherokee Storytelling by award winning Chelsea sculptor and artisan Gary Henson.

1 p.m. – Hat Contest with prizes awarded. Will Rogers’ favorite meal, white beans, cornbread and cobbler, served in the Museum Foyer. Guests welcome to tour the museum.

Presenting sponsor for Hats Off to Will is Cherokee Nation Businesses Cultural and Economic Development. The entertainment and program were supported in part by the Oklahoma Arts Council, which receives support from the State of Oklahoma and the National Endowment for the Arts.

This IWPC nonprofit event was organized in cooperation with the Will Rogers Memorial Museum and the Oklahoma Historical Society.

How did ‘Hats Off to Will' start?

Eighty years ago, at 11:46 a.m. on October 31, 1946, members of the Pocahontas Club laid a wreath on the Will Rogers Tomb. The memorial was still new, having only been dedicated a brief eight years earlier, in 1938. The iconic structure atop The Hill overlooking Tiawah Valley and the town of Claremore had already become a world renown site memorializing an uncommon man, his work, his life, his family and his people.

As a charter member of the Club in 1899, Will left his home on the Verdigris to become what we know today as a “Citizen of the World.” He traveled around the globe by land, sea and air. He stood witness to the good and the bad of humankind yet always believed in the basic goodness of all people. He advocated for peace through the process of finding common ground wherever and whenever he was called upon to speak, perform or write. Among his famous sayings is “I never met a man I didn’t like,” and “We will never have true civilization until we have learned to recognize the rights of others.”

What made Will Rogers special?

Will Rogers never lost his connection with the people, places and world that informed his humor, spurred his curiosity and sharpened his wit. Born and raised on the Verdigris River during the waning days of Indian Territory, Will embraced even chased life as he found it: A barn dance hosted by his ranch life friends back on the Dog Iron, a family picnic hosted by relatives living in the bustling town of Chelsea, visiting the bedside of friends at the first Indian Hospital in Claremore, addressing a gathering of Washington D.C. elite or standing center front on the gilded stages of Broadway in New York city.

The Pocahontas Club has been celebrating Will’s birthday anniversary since the Will Rogers Memorial Museum was opened in 1938. After the interment of his body on the Museum grounds in May 1944, the Pocahontas Club members organized one of the first public tributes to Will on his birth date November 4.

Will Rogers died in a plane crash on August 15, 1935, but it was not until May 22, 1944, that his body was returned to Rogers County for his final resting place. Later that year, he had been joined by his wife Betty Blake Rogers and their fourth child who died at the age of two in 1920. In the November 9, 1944, edition of The Claremore Progress, the Pocahontas Club was lauded for providing an “impressive service” commemorating the birth date of Will Rogers.

Quotes about Will Rogers

• V.V. McNitt, chairman, The McNaught Syndicate (This group is responsible for distributing Will Rogers’ written word around the world.): “With the passing of time, Will Rogers’ stature as a man increased. Will grew all through his life. He continues to grow. He was real, he was genuine, and in his various unique talents he was incomparable. No one ever can take his place.” 

• W. E. Sunday said Will asked him to assist in the purchase of the land where the memorial stands. He quoted Will in the May 25, 1944, edition of the Claremore Progress: “When the world gets tired of me and my act, I’m coming back here and build me a home on this hill and spend the rest of my time looking down on you folks in Claremore …” – Will Rogers
• Picture cutline in the Claremore Daily Progress, Friday, November 4, 1938: Will Rogers grew up just like a regular fellow. He went to parties, played drop the handkerchief, post office and all those games – and he also enjoyed hayrides. See him perched on the back end of the wagon, and he looks like he’s having a very good time. …
• Will H. Hays, president of The Motion Picture Producers & Distributors of America, Inc. (Claremore Daily Progress, Friday, November 4, 1938.): “A few are born who live beyond the memory of their contemporaries. As generations march by, these few become traditions and their names become symbols.

“So, it is with Will Rogers. In the corridors of time his name will echo with all those qualities he possessed.

“It will mean philosophy and humor; a love of truth and a contempt for sham; an enormous capacity for comradeship; unswerving loyalty and rugged honesty; an understanding of human problems and ungrudging charity for human needs; a generous impulse to look for the good in everyone; a deep love of country; a belief in man and an unquestioning faith in God.

“Will Rogers sat with the great but stood with the humble; judged men not for what they had, but for what they were. He was a good neighbor, a true friend, and a great American.”