“There are some things the Baby Boom has done that we’re not proud of. We used up all the weird. It has always been the special prerogative of youth to look and act strange, to alarm and surprise their elders with peculiar dress and manners. Cicero mentioned it. ‘O tempora! O mores!’ So did my mom, although in English. But the Baby Boom exhausted the available supply of peculiar. Weird clothes, we wore them. Weird beards, we grew them. Weird words and phrases, we said them. Weird attitudes, we had them. Thus when it came time for the next generation to alarm and surprise us with their peculiarities they were compelled to pierce their extremities and permanently ink their exposed flesh. That must have hurt. We apologize.”
The Corona virus appears, when least expected, In this case in my memories of my first “real” job now 50 years ago. “O tempora! O mores!” as that old windbag Cicero once exclaimed.
Afterward: For more on how Scanlan’s Monthly in June 1970 failed to disrupt that august race try as it might to disrupt the derby as effectively as Covid-19 already has, please six years ago, I published this account of my eight month career at Scanlan’s because I badly needed to raise money to attend my younger daughter Amelia Altalena’s wedding where I “gave away the bride.” This posting below was a gimmick to sell my complete set of Scanlan’s Monthly.Had I not loved my daughter so, I might have waited forever before parting for $480 with this memory of what I had done when I was 23– now 50 years ago.
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Think twice about Germany. From my personal collection.
Premature Publication
Why this posting is being published before completion:
To await the references from William Gillis, editor The American Historian, to arrive by U.S. mail. Gillis is the author of a brilliant paper on Scanlan’s Monthly written as a graduate student at E.W. Scripps School of Journalism. Here is a link to the paper presented at the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication in Toronto, Canada, August: 2004. http://list.msu.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0411a&L=aejmc&P=46716
To acknowledge that without Gillis’s paper giving my 8 issue service at Scanlan’s a patina of respectability, I would not have had the courage to write let alone publish this work in progress.
To sell a complete set on Scanlan’s on e-Bay or to the highest bidder, preferably a well-healed university. Gillis says it is difficult now for scholars to read the publication. [Scholars!]
To entice Ralph Steadman to send me the original drawings of his work that appeared in Scanlan’s. Most especially, this one which I saw him create at the editorial offices above a bar in the then seedy section of Times Square.
Scanned from my personal collection
[Query: How do I get this to read 7 instead of 1?] As a kindly suggestion for Chanukah / Christmas presents to suggest purchasing children’s book and not-for-children art as gifts while the British pound is weak and the dollar strong: http://www.ralphsteadman.com/
To locate J.C. Suares whose work at Scanlan’s prepared for the creation with David Schneiderman of the op-ed page of The New York Times.
To express appreciation to Warren Hinckle III [http://www.argonaut360.com/] not only for having shared with him months of near-lunacy [near?] but appreciation for his work at Rampart’s which convinced Martin Luther King, Jr. to denounce the War in Vietnam.
Martin Luther King speaks out against the Vietnam War, Riverside Church, New York City, April 4, 1967. I was a sophomore at Columbia at the time and attended the speech. To the left is bearded Rabbi Abraham Heschel, Professor of Theology and Mysticism at the Jewish Theological Seminary. Rabbi Heschel wrote a letter to my draft board saying that it was in keeping with Jewish tradition for me to be a conscientious objector
[Query: How do I get this to read 9 instead of 1?] To allow frequent site contributor Hadley Baxendale to make a pre-publication comment to this prematurely published posting.
To convince my skeptical webmaster and friend Kathy Forer I really did work for a publication that PAID for advertising
My first “real” job: Scanlan’s Monthly 1971 [NOT for minors]
Working at Scanlan’s was one of the weirdest experiences of my life
The advertisement that begins this posting is a good example of what I mean by weird:
This is the back cover of the second issue of Scanlan’s Monthly where in 1970 I worked on the editorial staff after having been hired at the downstairs bar of Sardi’s Restaurant.
This is the upstairs bar at Sardi’s:
Sardi’s Restaurant is located on West 44th Street in the Times Square neighborhood of Manhattan. Founded in 1927, Sardi’s is across from the center of the theater district.
The restaurant appears regularly in films showing Broadway producers, playwrights, and actors celebrating or bemoaning the first performance of a play. Generally, the scene includes an out loud reading of a review from The New York Times, a review that either made or broke the play. [Note: the offices of The New York Times are around the corner; Clive Barnes then its theater critic was a bar regular.]
Working out of bars in fancy New York City restaurants was an essential part of my first real job after graduating from Columbia College. [Many years later President Barack Obama received his bachelor’s degree from Columbia.]
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I was 21 years old, having majored in Medieval European History without a salable skill to my name except the bravado to convince the magazine’s already notorious editors to hire me.
This was regarded as a dream job for any journalism school graduate. Only I was not a journalism graduate and had no formal training. As it would turn out, now that I am weeks away from my 67th birthday, I had no formal training to do any of the jobs that punctuated my career including:
Writing a speech for a controversial President of Lebanon who was literally blown up before he was able to deliver it
Publishing a book on food policy read by the most influential Secretary of Agriculture in my lifetime with whom I became telephone buddies after he was forced to resign from office in disgrace
Working on a report on the M1 tank for Congress’ General Accountability Office
Serving as a political appointee in the Carter Administration in a job requiring extensive security clearance and confirmation by the U.S. Senate
Designing on-line documentation for startup companies in the Silicon Valley of California describing how to use a software product when the software had not yet been completed
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My first task of the day was to report to my boss the late Sidney Zion, co-editor of Scanlan’s Monthly. Instead of going to the magazine’s office, located between Broadway and Seventh Avenue, I got off the subway at Eighth Avenue and climbed the steps to the bar. Sidney appeared, first thing in the morning (11 A.M.) for his first scotch on the rocks.
Sidney, formerly a legal reporter for The New York Times, was my boss because only he was allowed to write checks.
Sidney’s co-editor Warren Hinckle, III, who had turned Rampart’s Magazine from a Catholic school publication into the Bible of the 1960s counterculture, was so notoriously a spendthrift he had to ask Sidney to write checks for his many expensive story ideas and ventures.
Warren Hinckle III in a San Francisco bar 36 years after he hired me. Photo courtesy Wikipedia
Warren was the most brilliant editor I ever worked for. (I have worked with many brilliant editors). With rare often disquieting exceptions, Sidney did little work.
Warren ran the magazine. Running the magazine was often a complicated affair because Warren lived in San Francisco where he had an office and staff —flying into New York once a week. My first experience with a FAX was the now primitive contraption that tied the two offices together sending editorial material and nonsense back and forth from coast to coast.
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Let us start with the advertisement that begins this posting: Think twice about Germany. The third issue of Scanlan’s, for which I co-authored with Warren the cover story on Russian Pornography, had an editorial “THAT LUFTHANSA AD.”
The editors explained:
“Since Scanlan’s charges money to print letters to the editor (write us a letter and we’ll send you the rates), we make things more or less even by buying advertising. Our back cover last month carried an ad for Lufthansa, the German airlines—but not from Lufthansa.
“Some ads we buy because the editors like them and think they make interesting reading….Other ads we buy for other reasons, as you will see. One such ad appeared last month on our back cover. And for that story we take you to Advertising Age, the weekly newspaper of the advertising industry.
“NEW YORK, April 1—Second thoughts about the new Lufthansa German Airlines’ ad theme, ‘Think twice about Germany,’ appears to be in order.
“Scanlan’s Monthly’s April issue carries what at first glance appears to be a Lufthansa ad, but at second glance turns out to be a doctored version.
“The back cover ad of Scanlan’s substitutes two photos for the gemuelich scenes carried in the original Lufthansa ad, by D’Arcey Advertising. One of the pictures in the spurious ad shows a nude woman, hands bound behind her, about to be thrashed by a soldier while a cameraman records the scene. The second picture shows Wehrmacht officers giving the ‘Heil, Hitler’ salute.”
Thus endeth the editorial.
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Subsequent Ad Age reports, read by the Scanlan’s staff avidly, reported the agency pulled its expensive campaign, one executive complaining about Scanlan’s “They did not even bother to show it to us first.”
A lasting consequence of Warren and Sidney’s stunt is today all advertising contains a copyright line, not then considered necessary because no publication ever had the effrontery to BUY advertising.
After revealing one of my first tasks on the job was to deliver by hand the check to the man who doctored the ad, the best way to proceed is to show how buying ads was possible.
What follows are photographs of the covers of each of the eight monthly magazines (with short descriptions of each) Scanlan’s produced before it went bankrupt and I was left unemployed.
The first issue of Scanlan’s Monthly, March 1970 from my personal collection.Scanlan’s Monthly 2, April 1970, from my personal collection
Scanlan’s Monthly 3, May 1970, from my personal collection
Table of Contents
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Scanlan’s Monthly 4, June 1970, from my personal collectionScanlan’s Monthly 5, July 1970, from my personal collectionScanlan’s Monthly 6, August 1970, from my personal collectionScanlan’s Monthly 7, September 1970, from my personal collectionScanlan’s Monthly 8. This was the last and mostly despicable issue of Scanlan’s in which I had no hand in creating although I was there at the time. The editors explained the date thusly: “This issue, Volume 1, No. 8, is now January 1971, and will appear on the newsstands in early December. Our last issue, Volume 1, No. 7, was dated September and was on newsstands during September. All subscribers will receive twelve full issues during the term of their subscription.” Subscribers ate their hearts out. The magazine folded and I was out of work. From my personal collection.
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Copyright 2014 by Joel Solkoff. All rights reserved. As for the copyright status of bankrupt Scanlan's Monthly itself, the author welcomes comments from well-credentialed copyright attorneys.
Joel’s commentary: Last night, I had coffee with John Harris my neighbor and friend. John suggested if I want to learn Spanish, I sing Spanish songs. Promptly, a YouTube search of Spanish songs brought me to Enrique Iglesias.
Enrique Iglesias has a substantial portion of real estate on YouTube. His cross over into English dominates the site. Vevo videos, always a sign of quality, have sensuous videos with women so beautiful it can break your heart. But the songs are in English.
The Spanish songs are organized willy-nilly. Iglesias’ voice, always engaging, appears behind a static background. You don’t go to YouTube to see a photo. You go to YouTube for video and great video. Finally, I found: ENRIQUE IGLESIAS EN EL ESTADIO OLIMPICO. VERANO PRESIDENTE. 2 DE SEPTIEMBRE 2011. MASVIP.COM.DO.
Naturally, I provide basic flight information showing a Google Map of a flight from Miami to the Dominican Republic were you to go back in time and attend the concert.
The video is astonishing, an adjective I seldom use because it is hard to know what astonishing means. The video begins with a sweaty t-shirt and jean clad Iglesias going into the audience and hugging several luscious young women. This goes on for some time amid the sound of female fans howling with delight, reminiscent of Elvis Presley’s iconic appearance on the Ed Sullivan show. Great fun.
Iglesias plucks Rena out of the crowd. She is wearing a black tank top and white shorts. Rena cannot contain her delight as she and Iglesias go on stage. He briefly interviews her, asks her what song she wants him to sing, sings it while she mouths the words. Iglesias is engaging, charismatic, just plain wonderful with her.
He sings, passes the microphone to her but she refuses to sing several times until finally…. During the performance she is constantly taking photographs of Iglesias, showing them to him which he looks at in appreciation, and then he takes photos of the two of them together.
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As to why I am trying to learn Spanish, there are two reasons which I will elaborate in eccentrically multiple items:
My daughter Amelia who has been living in Pontevedra, Spain is planning to visit me in State College PA to celebrate the arrival of 2015 and take part in my community’s First Night Celebration. This is a link to last year’s celebration. Amelia will be arriving with her friend Javier who is a sergeant in the Spanish Army.
During Amelia’s multi-month sojourn to the U.S. last year, she also took a course in medical Spanish at her alma mater [ which means “nourishing mother”] UNC Ashville and took care of me before, during, and after my major and successful kidney cancer surgery in NYC, rooming with me at the American Cancer Society’s Hope Lodge.
[Note: Commentary to be resumed after I go out and purchase coffee. All out. An apartment without coffee is a terrible place.]
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Back from scooting to the store, going in the opposite direction of crowds of eager football fans en route to Penn State’s Homecoming game. We start again with my two reasons for learning Spanish with another lengthy list:
Beginning with muñeca cruel video, Spanish lyrics, English lyrics, and Iglesias’ official site:
muñeca cruel
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Spanish lyrics:
Un dia mas y tu no estas aqui
No me concentro tan solopienso enti Dicen que basta
Que es hora de vivir
y es imposible
Ves lo quequeda de mi Aqui esta mi cuerpo
Para que hagas lo que quieras de el Aqui esta mi alma
Para quesigasensanandote Aqui esta mi nombre
Para quepongas a sulado unacruz Aqui esta el final
De mis suenos escrito en tu papel
Muneca Cruel Aqui esta mi sangre
Que aun se altera cuando
mehablen detiAqui esta por fin mi futuro
Y tu no estas en el
Muneca CruelVuelve a llover
Todo me sienta mal
Salgo a buscarte
No se como empezarHago que duermo
Porque no quiero hablar
Mira mi vida
Es un desastre totalAqui esta mi cuerpo
Para que hagas lo que
quieras de elAqui esta mi alma
Para que sigas ensanandoteAqui esta mi nombre
Para que pongas a su lado una cruzAqui esta el final
De mis suenos escrito en tu papel
Muneca CruelAqui esta mi sangre
Que aun se altera cuando
me hablen de tiAqui esta por fin mi futuro
Y tu no estas en el
Muneca Cruel
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English lyrics:
Cruel Doll
Another day and you’re not here
I can’t concentrate I only think of you
They say that’s enough
That’s its time to live
And it’s impossible
Do you see what you left of me?
Here is my body
For you to do with what you want with it
Here is my soul
For it continues to follow you
Here is my name
So you can put a cross beside it
Here is the end of my dreams
Written on your paper
Cruel Doll
Here is my blood
Though it jumps when they
speak of you
Here at last is my future
And you’re not in it
Cruel Doll
The rain comes again
Everything feels bad
I go to find you
I don’t know how to begin
I sleep
because I don’t want to speak
Look at my life
it’s a total disaster
Here is my body
For you to do with what
you want with it
Here is my soul
For it continues to follow you
Here is my name
So you can put a cross beside it
Here is the end of my dreams
Written on your paper
Cruel Doll
Here is my blood
Though it jump when they
speak of you
Here at last is my future
And you’re not in it
Cruel Doll
Iglesias started his career in the mid-1990s on an American Spanish Language record label Fonovisa which helped turn him into one of the biggest stars in Latin America and the Hispanic Market in the United States becoming the biggest seller of Spanish-language albums of that decade.
By the turn of the millennium he made a successful crossover into the mainstream market and signed a multi-album deal with Universal Music Group for an unprecedented US $68,000,000 with Universal Music Latino to release his Spanish albums and Interscope to release English albums.
In 2010, he parted with Interscope and signed with another Universal Music Group label, Universal Republic Records.
In late 2012, Republic Records was revived after eleven years of being dormant, shuttering Universal Republic Records and taking all the artists from that label to Republic Records, including Iglesias.
In 2001, he released his single Hero, which he later performed to commemorate the victims of the 9/11attacks.
Iglesias has sold more than 100 million records worldwide, making him one of the best selling Spanish language artists of all time.
He has had five Billboard Hot 100 top five singles, including two number-ones, and holds the record for producing 25 number-one Spanish-language singles on theBillboard‘s Hot Latin Tracks.
He has also had 13 number-one songs on Billboard’s Dance charts, more than any other single male artist.
Altogether, Iglesias has amassed more than 70 number-one rankings on the various Billboardcharts. Billboard has called him The King of Latin Pop andThe King of Dance.
“Hero” is a single released by Enrique Iglesias from his second English albumEscape and was written by Iglesias, Paul Barry and Mark Taylor. Iglesias first released the song to radio in early September 2001 to a positive critical and commercial reception.
After theSeptember 11 attacks on theWorld Trade Center, the song was one of the few songs chosen by radio DJs in New York to be remixed with audio from police, firefighters, civilians at Ground Zero and politicians commenting on the attacks. He was asked to sing the song live at the benefit concertAmerica: A Tribute to Heroes ten days after the September 11, 2001 attacks. Iglesias broadcast his performance from a warehouse in New York alongside Bruce Springsteen, Bon Jovi, and Sheryl Crow. The location of the warehouse was kept secret in case of further attacks. It was Iglesias’ first televised performance of the song.
America: A Tribute to Heroes was a benefit concert created by the heads of the four major American broadcast networks; Fox, ABC, NBC and CBS.
Joel Gallen was selected by them to produce and run the show.
Actor George Clooney organized celebrities to perform and to man the telephone bank.
The marketing and public relations was headed by Warner Bros. EVP Corp Comm with assistance from the marketing and publicity departments of all four broadcast networks. It was broadcast live by the four major American television networks and all of the cable networks in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon in 2001.
Done in the style of a telethon, it featured a number of national and international entertainers performing to raise money for the victims and their families, particularly but not limited to the New York City firefighters and New York City police officers. It aired September 21, 2001, uninterrupted and commercial-free. It was released on December 4, 2001 on compact disc and DVD.
On a dark stage illuminated by hundreds of candles, twenty-one artists performed songs of mourning and hope, while various actors and other celebrities delivered short spoken messages.
Some of the musicians including Neil Young and Eddie Vedder were heard working the phone banks taking pledges. The money raised amounted to over $200 million, and was given to the United Way‘s September 11 Telethon Fund.
Lucas Cranach (1509-1533) painted this one of his many versions of Adam and Eve.
1. At sunset, tonight [September 24, 2014 on the solar calendar] the Jewish holiday of Rosh Hashanah began.
2. Rosh Hashanah marks the beginning of the new year 5775.
3. According to Wikipedia tonight “is believed to be the anniversary of the creation of Adam and Eve, the first man and woman, and their first actions toward the realization of humanity’s role in God‘s world.”
Lucas Cranach (1509-1533) painted this one of his many versions of Adam and Eve.
3. Here is The Jewish Publication Society’s translation from the book of Genesis. “And God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. They [sic] shall rule the fish of the sea, the birds of the sky, the cattle, the whole earth, and all the creeping things that creep on earth. And God created man in His image, in the image of God He created them; male and female. He created them. God blessed them and God said to them, ‘Be fertile and increase, fill the earth and master it; and rule the fish of the sea, the birds of the sky, and all the living things that creep on earth.'” The creation of Adam and Eve took place on Friday, the sixth day of creation.
4. “Chabad, also known as Habad, Lubavitch, and Chabad-Lubavitch, is an Orthodox Jewish, Hasidic movement,” explains Wikipedia. According to Chabad, whose Orthodox movement inspired the first eight years of my elementary school education: “Rosh Hashanah…emphasizes the special relationship between G‑d and humanity: our dependence upon G‑d as our creator and sustainer, and G‑d’s dependence upon us as the ones who make His presence known and felt in His world. Each year on Rosh Hashanah, ‘all inhabitants of the world pass before G‑d like a flock of sheep,’ and it is decreed in the heavenly court ‘who shall live, and who shall die . . . who shall be impoverished, and who shall be enriched; who shall fall and who shall rise.’ But this is also the day we proclaim G‑d King of the Universe. The Kabbalists teach that the continued existence of the universe is dependent upon the renewal of the divine desire for a world when we accept G‑d’s kingship each year on Rosh Hashanah.”
5. A note on the spelling of God’s name. When I was a student at the Hebrew Academy of Greater Miami, (when founding Rabbi Alexander S. Gross was principal), I wrote God’s name thusly, “G-d.” To be more precise, I followed standard practice of altering the spelling of God’s name in Hebrew. The teaching was in keeping with the Commandment not to take the Lord’s name in vain. One did not say the name correctly or spell it out in English or Hebrew.
6. Subsequently, I became a member of Conservative and Reform synagogues where observance is not taken as literally as my elementary schooling.
Rabbi David Ostrich
7. I am currently a member of State College PA’s Brit Shalom, a congregation that combines Conservative and Reform practice. My rabbi is David Ostrich, a wonderful man.
8. Rabbi Ostrich has just written a special prayer-book for Rosh Hashanah and the High Holidays. It is called the machzor.
9. Wikipedia: “The mahzor…is the prayer book used by Jews on the High Holidays of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur….The prayer-book is a specialized form of the siddur, which is generally intended for use in weekday and Shabbat services.The word mahzor means ‘cycle’ (the root … means ‘to return’). It is applied to the festival prayer book because the festivals recur annually.”
10. Brit Shalom exclusive: Rabbi Ostrich’s mahzor has just been published this Rosh Hashana.
11. Here is a section Rabbi Ostrich emailed me yesterday from the mahzor:
12. QUESTIONS AND MYSTERIES WITH WHICH WE STRUGGLE
“As much as we are masters of our own fates—making decisions and living with the consequences, there are also times when greater powers toss us around like small boats on a stormy sea.
“Whether the “storm” is caused deliberately by God—as a punishment or a test—or by the vagaries of the natural world, we find ourselves victims or objects of the slings and arrows of fortune. Are events pre-determined, or do we have free will?
“This ominous prayer, Un’taneh Tokef, has for some 1500 years represented our people’s grappling with this question.
“We know that many of our decisions make a difference, but we also know that greater powers impact our lives in significant ways.
“We pray that the greatest of powers eases our way and makes our challenges manageable, and we pray that the decisions we make will be good ones.”
A live recording from the Vocalise Festival on November 23, 2010 in Potsdam, Germany.
Cantor Azi Schwartz and the RIAS Kammerchor, conducted by Ud Joffe. This setting of Un’tane Tokef (from the High Holy Days liturgy) by Raymond Goldstein.
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I Joel wish you my readers a sweet and happy New Year. May you be recorded in the Book of Life.
We found the same funhouse used in the movie Grease, and we made the 2800 miles round trip to film a shot-for-shot recreation of the end of the movie: http://bit.ly/GreasePotParody
For media inquires, please email [email protected]
Note: Florida goes to the polls on November 4, 2014 to vote on Amendment 2 to legalize medical marijuana.
We found the same funhouse used in the movie Grease, and we made the 2800 miles round trip to film a shot-for-shot recreation of the end of the movie: http://bit.ly/GreasePotParody For media inquires, please email [email protected]
“Yellowstone National Park is located primarily in the U.S. state of Wyoming, although it also extends into Montana and Idaho. It was established by the U.S. Congress and signed into law by President Ulysses S. Grant on March 1, 1872
“Yellowstone, widely held to be the first national park in the world, is known for its wildlife and its many geothermal features, especially Old Faithful Geyser, one of the most popular features in the park. It has many types of ecosystems, but the subalpine forest is most abundant. It is part of the South Central Rockies forests ecoregion.
“Native Americans have lived in the Yellowstone region for at least 11,000 years. The region was bypassed during the Lewis and Clark Expedition in the early 19th century. Aside from visits by mountain men during the early-to-mid-19th century, organized exploration did not begin until the late 1860s. The U.S. Army was commissioned to oversee the park just after its establishment. In 1917, administration of the park was transferred to the National Park Service, which had been created the previous year.”
Grand Prismatic Spring, Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming. Photo courtesy Chris Mickey, Media & Public Relations Manager Wyoming Office of Tourism
“The Grand Prismatic Spring in Yellowstone National Park is the largest hot spring in the United States, and the third largest in the world, after Frying Pan Lake in New Zealand and Boiling Lake in Dominica. It is located in the Midway Geyser Basin.
“Grand Prismatic Spring was noted by geologists working in the Hayden Geological Survey of 1871, and named by them for its striking coloration. Its colors match the rainbow dispersion of white light by an optical prism: red, orange, yellow, green, and blue.”
“The purpose of the meeting is to discuss locations for a series of five television commercials, each thirty seconds long, that Steve Horn, who is director of filmed television commercials, will be shooting for N.W. Ayer and its client, American Telephone and Telegraph.
“Alayne is speaking (she is a woman in her early thirties, with tortoiseshell eyeglasses and a broad, open Irish face): ‘Look, the Long Island Game Farm is fantastic, but the problem is we can’t use a camel.’
“Gaston says, “O.K., we cancel the camel.”
“Linda says: ‘How about llamas?’
“Steve says ‘Llamas are terrific. I like llamas, except they spit.’
“Jerry says, ‘How badly do we need llamas?’
“Alayne says: ‘Actually research says kids only remember the little things they can pick up–the cuddly bunnies. Research says if you show a kid a llama or a camel he usually doesn’t remember he’s seen one.'”