Marching Up Madison Avenue: How I beat the entrepreneurial odds armed with a pencil and my imagination. by Richard L. Gilbert
Trade Paperback	5 ½ x 8 ½	Nonfiction/Biography/Advertising
Release date: May 2008	200 pp	1933016515
	$14.95	Your order will be processed by Blu Sky Media Group

When the Greatest Generation came marching home, they buckled right down to work.  Marching Up Madison Avenue is the story of one of those men.

Richard L. Gilbert, born in New York, devoted Giants fan in the cheap seats of Coogan’s Bluff; CCNY grad; soldier, returned home in 1946. He needed a job. He found one in advertising. You don’t know his name (yet) but you’ll recognize his work.

In a 40-year career Richard Gilbert and his intrepid staff of copywriters, designers and artists at Gilbert Advertising changed how Americans thought about fur coats, foreign languages, cars, perfume and the Vietnam War.

Gilbert Advertising wasn’t the biggest shop on Madison Avenue but it was influential beyond its size.  From encouraging the Metropolitan Opera to offer less than full season subscriptions (unheard of till 1971) in the Met’s first ad campaign; to persuading people Renault had mended its ways (a Renault for the people who swore they’d never buy another) to tweaking the tail of the Russian Bear (Premier Kosygin, we’d like to give you a free tuxedo); London Fog rainwear; Berlitz Language school, and Club Med, Gilbert Advertising was the creator of iconic pop culture images that remain fresh and persuasive years later.

Along the way Richard Gilbert spearheaded the ad campaign that helped end the Vietnam war (The First American Ballot on the War; Some Toys Hate War) and helped litigate protection of commercial free speech.

Armed only with a pencil, and indomitable American can-do spirit, Richard Gilbert marched up Madison Avenue into history. This is his story, and ours.

Reviews and Accolades

Marching Up Madison Avenue is about Richard L. Gilbert, whose advertising agency made a small contribution to American economic dominance between 1950 and 1990… (and) is relevant to marketers, creative professionals, and historians. Written with optimism and wholesomeness, the narrative makes reference to songs such as "Shine on Harvest Moon," events such as the Cuban Missile Crisis, and old-school lux lifestyles that included mink coats…(along with) providing…fragments of the history of business and advertising during a specific era.
-Library Journal