Member-only story
Words are Important
How One Professor was Worth the Price of College
“Last night I went to bed with a good book. Me!”
When you think of people who have made a significant impact on your life, who comes to mind? I’m not speaking of friends and family — I mean, it goes without saying that Mom has always been my biggest advocate, but don’t we come to expect that from such close ones?
What comes to my mind are people who helped me in some way. It may not be in-your-face helping me today (that would be called a live-in therapist), but someone from whom you learned a lesson that helped you later in life.
January 9, 1978. The winter cold sets upon a new semester at the University of Nebraska. As a junior, the focus of my classes now become journalism and advertising, having already finished up with the prerequisites. Math was my nemesis. That alone would never let me have a 4.0 — ever! Taking Algebra 1 in grade school twice was painful enough.
Introducing Professor Albert C. Book. At the time he was “just” a professor, but soon became chair of the advertising department in the school of journalism.
Coming to the corn fields of Nebraska, Book was a “Mad Man” from one of New York’s premier advertising agencies, BBDO. They were the people who brought you “Us Tareyton Smokers Would…
