Will Rogers In 1947, a college football bowl game was named in his honor, but the event folded after the first year. The Academy of Western Artists, based in Gene Autry, Oklahoma, presents an annual Will Rogers Medallion award for excellence in western literature. The Will Rogers Shrine of the Sun is the name of an 80-foot observation tower on Cheyenne Mountain west of Colorado Springs, at the base of Pikes Peak near the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo. Rogers's California home, stables, and polo fields are preserved today for public enjoyment as Will Rogers State Historic Park in Pacific Palisades. His widow, Betty,
Will Rogers isolationism for the US. According to scholar Peter Rollins (1976), Rogers appeared to be an anchor of stability; his conventional home life and traditional moral code reminded people of a recent past. His newspaper column, which ran from 1922 to 1935, expressed his traditional morality and his belief that political problems were not as serious as they sounded. In his films, Rogers began by playing a simple cowboy; his characters evolved to explore the meaning of innocence in ordinary life. In his last movies, Rogers explores a society fracturing into competing classes from economic pressures. Throughout his career, Rogers was