"A friend is someone who knows all about you but…

“A friend is someone who knows all about you but likes you anyway” is a popular saying that has been printed on many posters. The saying was written by an unknown ten-year-old schoolboy and was popularized in 1905. “A friend is a fellow who knows all about you, but likes you” was cited in the April 1905 Century Magazine.

“Your friend is the man who knows all about you, and still likes you” was written in 1910 by Elbert Hubbard (1856-1915). Hubbard often receives credit for the saying, but he wrote five years after the saying had been popularized.

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April 1905, The Century Magazine, “In Lighter Vein,” pg. 960, col. 2:
A single definition and I am done. It is the most soul-satisfying conception of a friend that it has been my fortune to meet with. May its ten-year-old originator find a David for his Jonathan. “A friend is a fellow who knows all about you, but likes you.”
Agnes Deans Cameron,
Principal of South Park School,
Victoria, British Columbia.

Chronicling America
4 June 1905, The Salt Lake Tribune (Salt Lake City, UT), “Kirke La Shelle’s Methods,” Magazine Section, pg. 11, col. 3:
He was a friend indeed—one who fitted that description by a Manchester schoolboy in an essay the other day: “A friend is a person who knows all about you, and likes you just the same.”

Chronicling America
6 June 1905, Brownsville (TX) Daily Herald, pg. 3, col. 4:
A True Definition.
Waxahachie Light.
A school boy has defined “friend” as a “person who knows all about you, but likes you just the same,: and it would be hard to find a better definition.

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What Makes a Friend?:
Definitions and Opinions from Various Sources
Compiled an collected by Volney Streamer
New York, NY: Brentano’s
1909
Pg. 38:
A “friend is a fellow who knows all about you, but likes you.”— A Ten-year-old Schoolboy.

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August 1910, The Philistine, pg. 65:
Your friend is the man who knows all about you, and still likes you.

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A Thousand & One Epigrams,
Selected from the Writings of Elbert Hubbard
By Elbert Hubbard
East Aurora, NY: The Roycrofters
1911
Pg. 88:
Your friend is the man who knows all about you, and still likes you.

23 March 1941, Port Arthur (TX) News, “Right Off the Campus,” pg. 10, col. 5:
FRIEND: One who knows all about you but likes you anyhow.

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Typo Graphic
1950
Pg. 119:
A friend who knows all about you, but likes you anyway.

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Coronet
Volume 37
1954
Pg. 106:
And keep in mind this definition given by an old French grande-dame: “A friend is a person who knows everything about you, but likes you anyway.”

6 October 1965, Record American (Boston, MA), “Prime Ribs And Tripe,” by Bruce McCabe, pg. 26, col. 4:
“Mr, McCabe: A friend is someone who knows all about you but likes you anyway.” (Sylvester C. Perry, West Haven. Ct.)

14 January 1966, Omaha (NE) World-Herald, “High School Press,” pg. 2-T, col. 6:
“A friend is person who knows all about you. but likes you. anyway.” The Parrot, Dorchester (Neb.) School.

25 January 1966, Wichita Falls (TX) Times, “It Happened Last Night” by Earl Wilson, pg. 6,col. 7:
A friend is somebody who knows all about you—but likes you anyway.

Google News Archive
30 June 1979, Madison (IN) Courier, pg. 30, col. 1:
Friendship is a great gift — remember a friend is someone who knows all about you but likes you anyway.

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Phillips’ Treasury of Humorous Quotations
By Bob Phillips
Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House Publishers
2004
Pg. 101:
Your friend is the man who knows all about you and still likes you.
— Elbert Hubbard