Top Man of "Believe It or Not"

PERSUADING people to believe tall tales that are true brought a fortune to the late Robert L. Ripley, creator of the Believe It or Not cartoons. Douglas F. Storer '21, Ripley's manager from the early Thirties, and now president of Believe It or Not, Inc., is proving that the public's liking for Ripley's credulity tests was not based on a passing fashion. With a staff of artists and 86 additional assistants, BION is still going strong; the cartoons appear in more papers today than ever before.

Storer was working for an advertising agency when he first met Ripley and persuaded him to appear in a radio variety show he was putting on. Afterwards, when he became Ripley's personal manager, he dropped advertising to handle talent on a full-time basis. He has been manager for such stars as Bing Crosby, Ray Noble, Dale Carnegie, Bob Considine, and many others. Storer was largely responsible for Ripley's increased use of radio, which incirease'd fan mail to an estimated 3,000 letters a day and brought his audience into the millions.

One of the outstanding triumphs of the Believe It or Not program was Storer's arranging for Edward, Duke of Windsor, to broadcast from the Bahamas, shortly after his abdication. It was the first time the exKing of England had appeared on any commercial program. On it he hailed the bravery of the seven British seamen (an item uncovered by BION researchers) who drifted for 70 days in an open boat from the Coast of Africa, where their ship had been wrecked, to the British West Indies. Another feature which Storer helped to materialize was the broadcasting of BION programs from such unusual spots as the bottom of the Grand Canyon, the fortress of Corregidor, and a newly discovered chamber of the Carlsbad Caverns, 800 feet below the surface of the earth. In 1948 Ripley traveled with Storer to the Orient, sending broadcasts from Honolulu, Tokyo, Hong Kong, and Shanghai.

Dartmouth awarded Ripley an honorary Master of Arts degree in 1939. A Fellow of the Royal Geographic Society, he not only had traveled all over the world for rare items of information—some of which were lasting, if assorted, contributions to history, anthropology, and literature; he also had acquired a collection of unusual and valuable objects. He presented Dartmouth with an Oriental collection which includes carvings from ivory, tapestries, porcelain, temple items, and rare brass work. Storer's home is filled with curios which are the prized results of his research expeditions with Ripley.

One keepsake too big to put inside stands in Storer's front yard in New Rochelle: a totem pole made by the Nimikis Indians, representing to the passerby Great Spirits, Flying Eagle and Grizzly Bear.

DOUG STORER '21, President of Believe It or Not, Inc., and the totem pole that makes his home in New Rochelle an easy place to locate.