The Dartmouth Difference
My first assignment as a copywriter was to write a headline for Vicks VapoRub. Pop had told me that first impressions were very important, so I gave this ad my best shot. The result was gratifying as I got quick acclaim for the following headline: "To sleep, perchance to dream, ah, here's the rub!" Yes, Professor Childs was there beside me.
Those days in the early fifties were exciting for the advertising profession. The Reader's Digest accepted advertising for the first time, and our agency management said that it would be absolutely impossible to design a selling message on that small page so we were forbidden to run any ads in the Digest, but I knew differently, thanks to Professor Nash... and we could and did.
Television was in its infancy. We were now in the drama business... live. And I was prepared, thanks to Professors Williams and Pressey. And when it came time to write commercials, it was like Professor Bond, war hero, was at my side saying "Terse, terse, terse."
My management at the agency was an outgrowth of Professor Larmon, and, when it came time to head up the new business function and make presentations nonstop, Professor England was there telling me to modulate, to project, to speak to just one person.
Doing marketing projections was helped enormously by Professor Forsythe. Music is a critical part of commericals, and I knew that Professors Sternfeld and Wendlandt were with me. I built five buildings which I designed myself, thanks to Ray Nash and marvelous Professor Morrison... "Form follows function." Remember! Professors West, Robinson, Chan, Folger, Dargan, and Hurd. They were greats. They were a faculty "who reached far beyond their grasp." They were with me throughout my career. They were my inspiration. They got me fired up. I caught the fire! I carried the torch.
In December of 1982 I crash-landed against the word "mortality." I was going into the operating room to have my heart stopped for a while. From freshman English I knew that my heart shouldn't be troubled, that peace had been left to me and that it would indeed be mine. And I thought of Professor Childs making me learn, "And they shall make the face of heaven so beautiful that all the world will fall in love with night and pay no worship to the garish sun." I closed by eyes and "lay down to pleasant dreams."
At that moment of personal crisis the Dartmouth faculty didn't fail me as they haven't all my life!
That is what is at the heart of the Dartmouth experience. That is the Dartmouth difference!
And so to the English Department and to Department Chairman Arthur Jensen in particular, I want to dedicate these lines by an unknown author, because they seem to best sum up what the English Department was trying to say to me and to all of us who would have the great and rare privilege of sharing the uniquely Dartmouth Experience.
The future belongs to those who believe in The beauty of their dreams, And happiness lies in The joy of achievement and the thrill of creative effort.
So, do not follow where the path may lead, Go, instead, where there is no path And leave a trail.
That's the heart of Dartmouth.
This is an excerpted version of a speech Goss delivered when he received an Alumni Award May 1.
