Jean Merrill > Quotes

“My father always says one thing leads to another. It certainly does. I started out to buy a friend a birthday present, and I end up trying to get a factory to go with it....”
― Jean Merrill, The Toothpaste Millionaire

“Crackpots have a vote like everyone else...enough crackpots could vote a mayor into office.”
― Jean Merrill, The Pushcart War

“The trouble with adults is that they never believe kids can do something even when they have good ideas.”
― Jean Merrill, The Toothpaste Millionaire

“Carlos was known to the pushcart peddlers as the most skillful carton-flattener in the Lower East Side section of New York City. Carlos' business was to go around to small stores that had clean cardboard cartons which they wished to be rid of. With two or three deft motions, Carlos would flatten the cartons and carefully stack them on his pushcart. Carlos was the only flattener in the business who could stack to a height of twelve feet without the cartons slipping off.”
― Jean Merrill, The Pushcart War

“Hey, lady,” said one of the officers, “the war’s over. Haven’t you heard?” “Certainly,” she said. “We’re just celebrating.” “Oh,” said the policeman, and looking around, he could see that everyone was laughing and in the best of spirits. “Well, in that case,” the officer said—and he took the cantaloupe from her hand and hurled it with deadly accuracy right into the back of a fleeing truck driver, knocking the fellow headlong into a cart of tomatoes. “You’re wonderful!” shouted the redheaded lady, clapping her hands and kissing the policeman. It was a wild morning.”
― Jean Merrill, The Pushcart War

“It was Miriam's ambition to have an office job with daytime hours so that she would not miss the evening television shows.”
― Jean Merrill, The Pushcart War