Broadcasting Telecasting (Jan-Mar 1960)

OUR RESPECTS TO . John Philip Jack Cunningham has preserved a singular individuality during 40 years in the agency business where the "different" is often commonplace. There are as many anecdotes and advertising lore about John Philip Cunningham, board chairman and the man from Cunningham & Walsh, as there are clients making up C&W's $60 million annual billing list (half of it in radio-tv). Several years ago, for example, he concluded that the best product client New York Daily News had to "sell" was news itself, and set up an agencymanned special desk in the city room where starting at 2 a.m. galleys prepared for that morning's paper were read for use as a basis for teaser spots to be broadcast at 6 a.m. on five metropolitan New York radio stations. Mr. Cunningham and a few agency vice presidents manned the desk the first night to launch the campaign. At about 5 a.m., each man took a copy of the commercial for hand delivery to a station. WRCA at Rockefeller Center was Mr. Cunningham's run and after a few false approaches he stumbled into the right room. A youngster was "in charge" and asked Mr. Cunningham to leave the script on an announcer's desk. Mr. Cunningham refused, told the boy he was responsible for the script getting on the air and left. A phone call later that day from WRCA management thanked him for the script and said, "There's a kid here who says the agency sent over a rather cantankerous, elderly messenger to deliver it." But Jack Cunningham has a personality that's best known for charm and wit. To agency men, he is the impeccable model of the rounded agency man. He can write, draw, research, select media and plan merchandising and dealer displays. And he's a natural when it comes to handling or winning an account. Squibb Story • When Newell-Emmett was pitching for the E.R. Squibb & Sons account some years ago Jack was in the Far East junketing with an airline client. A cablegram called for the services of Mr. Cunningham. He caught the next plane back to New York to fill an early-morning appointment with the Squibb people. He entered the advertiser's office to be greeted by "show us" scowls. One executive asked, "Well, what do you think you can do for us?" The Cunningham grin lit up and he replied, "The way I feel I think I can fall flat on my face for you" and told Cunningham them about his trip. He got the account. His ads have the "Cunningham touch." An ad once showed a bottle of White Rock alongside a tumbler of amber liquid into which an ice cube had been dropped. The headline read: "We fix flats." At C&W, Mr. Cunningham, who was board chairman of the 4A's in 1952-53 and is on its advisory council, is known for his personal approach to ad problems. An expert bridge player, Mr. Cunningham plays his hand in advertising with the advantage of having one of the most agile minds in the field. His brilliance, wit and ingenuity not only have won him accounts and plaudits of the most professional ad practitioners but have added an individual flavor to C&W itself. His "Man from Cunningham & Walsh" promotion — agency executives work in the field for a week or two selling the client's product — was an agency masterpiece. Back in 1945 Jack Cunningham decided to learn more about Texaco, an account C&W obtained in 1936. He worked at a gas station in the Bronx, parking his Cadillac (he now drives a Jaguar, also a client) two blocks away. Out of this experience came Texaco ads featuring the "friendly Texaco dealer," emphasizing clean rest rooms, etc. With tv becoming more importan! in advertising, Mr. Cunningham's interest in the medium increased. He captured Madison Avenue's ear in C&W's Cunningham The auto comes second October 1957 by charging tv programming was suffering from "creeping boredom." He's since thumped for a nationwide educational tv channel, for network-station responsibility for what goes over the air and has hinted the publishing concept with adequate protection for sponsors may be in order for tv. Tv, he says, is one of the most "rewarding instruments" of the century to which even the mass production of the automobile is secondary in impact on society. "Only with advertiser support could tv do this so fast and so well, and now perhaps it is time to study it to see if changes should be made in the best interests of the public." A Saga Starts • The saga of Jack Cunningham began Sept. 17, 1897, when he was born in Lynn, Mass. (and brought up in Medford), the second of seven children. At Harvard he took a wartime speed-up course and was graduated cum laude with a bachelor of arts degree; he was No. 1 in a Navy personnel training class and served in World War I as an ensign. In New York he turned to advertising where he thought he could best "make my niche." He was employed at Newell-Emmett for $20 a week and sent his laundry home. In the 20s he met Patricia Fitzpatrick of Riverdale, N.Y., marrying her in London in 1924 and honeymooning in Paris (he returned to New York with bride and $17). The Cunninghams live in Spuyten Duyvill on the Hudson River in a stone structure built in 1840 (he likes Victorian houses with lots of gingerbread). Two Hungarian escapees live with them (they have no children). They vacation in Bermuda where they own a house. Mr. Cunningham started as an artist at Newell-Emmett and moved into copy, becoming vice president in charge of creative production in 1930. In 1949, the agency was changed to Cunningham & Walsh. Mr. Cunningham became executive vice president, was elected president in 1954 and became board chairman four years later. In 1956, C&W lost the $20 million Chesterfield account but picked up $25 million in the next three months. Mr. Cunningham played lacrosse in college, now plays tennis, swims and skis. As a conversationalist, it is said he "could have shone in any of the great 18th Century London coffee houses." He likes the headline for Folger solvent coffee a C&W staffer once produced: "The 'instant taste' is gone." As for Jack Cunningham his "instant taste" for advertising shows no signs of going. BROADCASTING, February 29, 1960 95