Trip to Arizona proves to be bonanza for museum

Wednesday, April 12th 2000, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

Photo courtesy: Will Rogers Memorial, Claremore, Oklahoma. All Rights Reserved.

CLAREMORE, Okla. (AP) -- While going through some of his father's things, the adopted son of Will Rogers Jr. came across a box of documents he thought might be of interest to the Will Rogers Museum. He was right.

The documents include hand-written notes and edit marks made by Will Rogers on his typed newspaper columns, speeches, movie scripts and book manuscripts. One folder is full of telegrams the humorist sent home from all points of the world.

"This is like finding a treasure," said Joe Carter, president of Will Rogers Heritage Inc., a private foundation that assists the Will Rogers Memorial Commission. Carter traveled to Clem Rogers' home in Tucson, Ariz., to see the artifacts.

"We're just now going through the folders," Carter said. "It's a slow process. These papers are old. No telling what all we have when we open them up to the scholars."

Seeing Carter's excitement over the box of discovered documents, Clem Rogers told Carter, "I have something else you might want. "That's when he brought out a hat.

It wasn't the common, more western Stetson that often sat cocked back on Will's head. It's a flat-rimmed straw, summer, Maurice Chevalier style hat.

Inside the brim are the initials W.R. and the right hat size, 73/8. Also inside the hat is evidence that Rogers apparently bought from Adams Bros. in Chicago.

The hat was manufactured by Dobbs Fifth Avenue in New York and had the recommended sale price of$3.50.

Carter said that the hat was a favorite of Rogers' wife, Betty, and daughter, Mary. The museum has a painting that depicts Will Rogers wearing the hat by artist Frank Szasz.

Carter estimates that auction houses could have gotten more than $100,000 for such a piece of celebrity clothing when the Will Rogers Follies was on Broadway.

The hat will be displayed at the museum along with fewer than half a dozen other hats and only two suits of clothes belonging to Rogers.

"It really is a rare find," Carter said. "We had no idea it existed."