50% sureLots of sources credit Fred Rogers with this, and they agree with each other. The book or the speech it first came from hasn't turned up yet.
What turned up
Rogers' on-camera remark documented in contemporaneous 2018 press coverage of the 'Won't You Be My Neighbor' footage; no Wikiquote sourced entry
Sources checked
mbird.comChecked using claude-sonnet-5, 20 August 2026March 2018 article describing the Won't You Be My Neighbor? trailer, quoting Rogers 'into the camera': independent non-aggregator corroboration of genuine documentary footage.
Nothing made from these words yet — Storyfaire is where they get made.