Maggie's Farm

 George M Cohan sent the following letter to a show biz paper on July 4, 1906 (borrowed from a Steyn piece):

I write my own songs because I write better songs than anyone else I know of. I publish these songs because they bring greater royalties than any other class of music sold in this country. I write my own plays because I have not yet seen or read plays from the pens of other authors that seem as good as the plays I write. I produce my own plays because I think I’m as good a theatrical manager as any other man in this line. I dance because I know I’m the best dancer in the country. I sing because I can sing my own songs better than any other man on the stage… I play leading parts in most of my plays because I think I’m the best actor available. I pay myself the biggest salary ever paid a song and dance comedian because I know I deserve it.

But believe me, kind reader, when I say, I am not an egotist.

Read Steyn's piece, You're a Grand Old Flag, which began as You're a Grand Old Rag  My image of Cohan is entirely mixed-up with Jimmy Cagney, who played Cohan in the 1942 Yankee Doodle Dandy.