“This is no way to live!” Even as he was dying of pneumonia, comedian “Groucho” Marx of the Marx Brothers fame still had the temerity to make his final words clever ones. (He died at at age 86 in 1977.) The last utterances of the famous have always proven fascinating, as though they might hold some special insight into the human condition.
See if you can identify the final words of entertainers, politicians, authors, and others in the quiz below.
Sometimes, last words can come under dispute. Thomas Jefferson likely said, “No, doctor, nothing more” as he was about to expire, though others in the room believe he uttered something about the date, which happened to be July 4, 1826.
Final thoughts might also be misquoted or embellished. When eighth president Martin Van Buren died in 1862, he said, “There is but one reliance.” Some newspapers, believing it to be an incomplete message, actually added to the quote: “There is but one reliance, and that is upon Christ, the free mediator for us all.” Van Buren, of course, couldn’t request a retraction.
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