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Who really said it

If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen

Said by Truman — but not coined by him Harry S. Truman 1884–1972 · 33rd President of the United States · popularizer, not originator
Disputed Free to reuse

Truman really did say it, and the best primary text is his Remarks at the Wright Memorial Dinner of the Aero Club of Washington, 17 December 1952. But in that very speech he introduced the line as “a saying that I used to hear from my old friend and colleague on the Jackson County Court” — he was quoting, not coining. Wikiquote files the saying under Misattributed for exactly that reason.

Last verified 9 Sep 2026 · how we verify · spot an error?

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Disputed wording — copy with the correction

“If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen” popularized by Harry S. Truman, who credited it to "my old friend and colleague on the Jackson County Court" in his Remarks at the Wright Memorial Dinner of the Aero Club of Washington, 17 December 1952. Truman used the saying but did not originate it. Via Quotle.info · Verbatim: “Harry, if you can't stand the heat you better get out of the kitchen.”

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In context

Evoking the themes of courage, resilience and leadership. Theme: "If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen". Atmospheric and restrained, cinematic directional light, a muted period-appropriate palette, fine grain and texture. Compose with generous empty space for the quote and a small credit line. No lettering in the image itself.

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Minimalist editorial slide for the quote "If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen". Clean background, a single muted accent color, generous negative space, subtle paper or linen texture, no literal illustration — let the words carry it. Reserve clear space for a serif quote and a small credit line. No lettering in the image itself.

Provenance

The primary source

Source
Remarks at the Wright Memorial Dinner of the Aero Club of Washington
Spoken
17 December 1952, 9:50 p.m. · Statler Hotel, Washington, D.C.
Credited by Truman to
“my old friend and colleague on the Jackson County Court” (unnamed)
Archive
Harry S. Truman Presidential Library & Museum — transcript and audio (SR60-133)

One of the results of this system is that it gives the President a good many hot potatoes to handle—but the President gets a lot of hot potatoes from every direction anyhow, and a man who can’t handle them has no business in that job. That makes me think of a saying that I used to hear from my old friend and colleague on the Jackson County Court. He said, “Harry, if you can’t stand the heat you better get out of the kitchen.” I’ll say that is absolutely true. Public Papers of the Presidents

The 1952 phrasing is “you better get out of the kitchen.” The tighter imperative that circulates today is the form Truman printed in Mr. Citizen (1960), still framed there as a saying he had rather than one he made.

Archival audio
Hear the remarks (Truman Library, SR60-133)
Truman Library: the full remarks, 17 December 1952

How the line is documented

  • Truman’s own words, 17 December 1952. He does not present the line as his: “That makes me think of a saying that I used to hear from my old friend and colleague on the Jackson County Court” — full transcript, Truman Library ↗, with an independent transcript at the American Presidency Project ↗.
  • He was already using it as a senator. A July 1942 item in the Soda Springs Sun called “If you don’t like the heat, get out of the kitchen” the favorite rejoinder of Senator Harry S. Truman when his war-contracts committee complained about his pace — phrases.org.uk ↗, which dates the item only to “July”; Barry Popik’s file dates the same syndicated column — Drew Pearson’s “Washington Merry-Go-Round” — to 12 July 1942 in the St. Petersburg Times ↗.
  • The specialists file it as not-his. Wikiquote places the saying under Misattributed: popularized rather than originated by Truman, credited to aide Harry H. Vaughan in Time (28 April 1952), and traced by Ralph Keyes to a Missouri colleague, Eugene “Buck” Purcell — Wikiquote ↗.
  • Truman said as much in print. In Mr. Citizen (1960) he wrote: “I used to have a saying that applies here, and I note that some people have picked it up” — then gave the modern wording — quoted at Wikiquote ↗.
Public domain

The passage quoted here is from remarks Truman delivered as President on 17 December 1952 and published in the Public Papers of the Presidents. Works prepared by an officer of the United States as part of official duties are not subject to copyright, so this text is free to reproduce. Note that Truman’s later book Mr. Citizen (1960), where the tighter modern wording appears, is a commercially published work and is not covered by that exemption — which is why the 1952 remarks are the text shown.

Rights status is our research, not legal advice — and copyright varies by country and edition. For commercial or published use, confirm with the rightsholder. See terms.

Fact-check

Who gets the credit — and who should

This is not a fabricated quote. It is a real saying that Truman said out loud, in public, more than once. The error is narrower and more interesting: the world credits him with writing a line he was openly repeating.

Harry S. Truman popularizer, not author

In the 1952 speech that fixed the phrase in American English, Truman prefaces it: “That makes me think of a saying that I used to hear from my old friend and colleague on the Jackson County Court.” He then quotes the man directly — Truman Library ↗.

Harry H. Vaughan credited in 1952

Truman’s military aide was credited with the saying in Time on 28 April 1952, the attribution recorded by the Yale Book of Quotations — see Barry Popik’s citation file ↗. It stuck for a while, but nothing places the coinage with Vaughan.

Eugene “Buck” Purcell per Ralph Keyes

Wikiquote ↗, citing Ralph Keyes’s The Quote Verifier (2006), identifies Truman’s Missouri colleague as Purcell. Truman himself never gave the name, so this is Keyes’s identification rather than a documented self-attribution.

The polished modern form tightened later

What Truman actually said in 1952 was “Harry, if you can’t stand the heat you better get out of the kitchen.” The crisp imperative everyone quotes is the form he printed himself in Mr. Citizen (1960), where he wrote that he “used to have a saying” and noted that people had picked it up — Wikiquote ↗.

Truman used the saying from at least 1942 and made it famous in 1952 — but he presented it as borrowed, and on 17 December 1952 he pointed at the man he borrowed it from: read the passage ↗.

Context

Why it stuck to him

Truman was president when the phrase entered general American speech, and he used it the way other people use a shrug — as a standing answer to anyone complaining about pressure. By July 1942, when he was still a senator running the war-contracts investigating committee, a syndicated column already called a version of it his “favorite rejoinder,” according to the citation file assembled by Barry Popik ↗.

What makes the 1952 Aero Club speech the right source is not just that the words are there — it is that Truman stops to say where he got them. He is talking about presidential decisions as “hot potatoes,” and the saying arrives as a piece of remembered courthouse wisdom, complete with the man who said it addressing him by his first name: “Harry.” The Truman Library holds the audio ↗.

He did not coin it. He credited it — out loud, in the speech that made it famous.

The competing claims, briefly

Harry H. Vaughan. Truman’s military aide was credited with the line in Time on 28 April 1952 — the attribution that the Yale Book of Quotations records, per Popik’s file ↗. Vaughan was a famously quotable presence around Truman, which is enough to explain the confusion without making him the source.

Eugene ‘Buck’ Purcell. Wikiquote ↗, citing Ralph Keyes’s The Quote Verifier (2006), identifies Truman’s Missouri colleague as Purcell. That fits Truman’s own description of an old friend from the Jackson County Court, but the identification belongs to Keyes — Truman never named the man in the speech.

Explore

Filed under

More provenance-checked quotes on the same theme, each with its reuse status.

Courage Resilience Leadership

Go further

Dig deeper

Trusted places to keep pulling the thread — primary archives, fact-checks, and scholarship. We show how we used each one before you leave.

Remarks at the Wright Memorial Dinner of the Aero Club of Washingtontrumanlibrary.gov

The primary text. Truman introduces the line as a saying he used to hear from his old friend and colleague on the Jackson County Court.
Sound recording SR60-133 — Truman at the Aero Clubtrumanlibrary.gov

Archival audio of the 17 December 1952 remarks; the catalogue description notes Truman using the phrase.
Remarks at the Wright Memorial Dinner (transcript)presidency.ucsb.edu

The American Presidency Project’s copy of the same remarks, useful as an independent transcript.
Harry S. Truman — Misattributeden.wikiquote.org

Wikiquote lists the saying as popularized but not originated by Truman, notes the 1952 Time credit to Harry H. Vaughan, and cites Ralph Keyes for Eugene ‘Buck’ Purcell.
‘If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen’barrypopik.com

Barry Popik’s dated citation file, running from a 12 July 1942 newspaper column through the 1952 Time attribution to Vaughan.
Meaning and origin of the phrasephrases.org.uk

Quotes the July 1942 Soda Springs Sun item calling the line a favorite rejoinder of Senator Truman.

The popularizer

About Harry S. Truman

Harry S. Truman

1884–1972 · 33rd President of the United States (1945–53)

Harry S. Truman was a Missouri farmer, failed haberdasher and Jackson County judge before he became a U.S. senator (1935–45) and then, on Franklin Roosevelt’s death, the 33rd President of the United States. His reputation rests as much on plain Missouri speech as on the decisions themselves — and this line is the purest example of it. He said it constantly, and he never claimed to have invented it: the phrasing he used in public was a borrowed county-courthouse saying he carried to the White House.

For writers & researchers

Cite this

Primary source

Harry S. Truman, “Remarks at the Wright Memorial Dinner of the Aero Club of Washington,” 17 December 1952, in Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Harry S. Truman (Harry S. Truman Presidential Library & Museum), https://www.trumanlibrary.gov/library/public-papers/351/remarks-wright-memorial-dinner-aero-club-washington.

This verification page

Quotle.info. “Who really said ‘If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen’?” Last verified 9 Sep 2026. https://quotle.info/who-said/if-you-cant-stand-the-heat-get-out-of-the-kitchen/

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