CheshireKids Entertainment

A Dr. Seuss for a Beagle?

The last book I wrote, now available on my website, and on Amazon is, “Should I Have Become a Furrier?” The book is about the choices we all make in our careers, whether we should take that job, and if we don’t, maybe we should have. Its not easy, and I’m basing the book on my career path, or to be more accurate, career paths. I remembered an incident, that I want to share with you. I was the art director for Grolier Enterprises, the advertising division of Grolier Publishing. One of products was “The Beginning Readers Book Club.” The books were mostly from Random House Publishing, and they included books by Dr. Seuss, the Bernstein Bears, and other highly acclaimed educational books created for children. We produced coupons, and sent them to teachers, to be distributed to the students, for their parents to enroll them. The coupons were mailed back to Grolier, and the information was actually hand keyed into the computer system, this process had some interesting failings. Apparently, someone sent in one of the coupons, signing up “Him and Her” Johnson, President Johnson’s two beagles, address 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington, D.C. The person who keyed in the information, did it as an automatic reflex, and didn’t comprehend the information. What we didn’t know was that, when the White House was sent a bill, they of course, didn’t pay it. When that happens, the computer starts to send a series of dunning statements. One day, the Vice President, and Creative Director, received a very nice letter on White House stationary, saying that although the books of “The Beginning Readers Book Club,” are wonderful, and very educational, they couldn’t see how the beagles “Him and Her” Johnson, could really benefit from them. We all had a really good laugh reading the letter, and I think we had it framed.