Quotes of the Day

“The most magnificent tax deduction I’ve ever seen.”
—Bob Hope on the opening of the Los Angeles County Art Museum, 1965. The museum is 45 years old today.

“It will not be long before the remainder of those dinosaur bones in the La Brea Tar Pits are covered with a newer, more elegant layer of civilization.”—Museum director Richard Brown, who knew less about geology than Hope did about tax deductions. Brown's prediction was completely backward: Oil began seeping up through the museum's reflecting pool, threatening to cover the elegant civilization in a layer of hydrocarbon sludge. The pool was drained and paved over.