ADVERTISING: Be Happy . . .

In the depression ’30s, according to a popular bit of advertising folklore, a mysterious stranger walked into the Manhattan office of American Tobacco Co. (Lucky Strike) and held out his hand to an executive. “In my hand,” said the stranger, “I have four words written on a piece of paper. They are worth $10,000 to you.” The executive looked at the paper and promptly paid $10,000 for the four words. The words: “Be Happy—Go Lucky.”

But—still according to the legend—American Tobacco decided that it couldn’t use the wonderful slogan after all. The slogan was so obvious that thousands of people would claim they had thought it up and demand payment.

Last week the legend was revived. The reason: Lucky Strike had launched a $10 million ad campaign which, for the first time on a nationwide basis, used the slogan: “Be Happy—Go Lucky!” The reaction was immediate. The company was flooded with letters demanding payment; a few of the writers threatened to sue. But American Tobacco, said Advertising Manager A. R. Stevens, would pay no one. Stevens also tried to lay the fiction, once & for all, with some facts.

There had never been any mysterious stranger and none of the other legends about the slogan were true. Actually, the slogan had been kicking around the company almost since it was founded. “How could we miss it?” asked Stevens. “The phrase is even in the dictionary and at least 80 songs have been written with that title.” The slogan was used on place cards called “Happy-Go-Luckies” in the early 1930s and on a few posters in 1937. But American did not plug it hard, for a reason baffling to non-admen: American simply did not think it was very good. Nevertheless, for years the company has received scores of letters* a month suggesting it. American Tobacco has finally decided to use the “Be Happy—Go Lucky” slogan because it has just the right tone to “catch the cheerful spirit in today’s troubled world.”

* According to another legend, R. J. Reynolds Tobacco (Camels) has also been advised by letter writers to use the slogan “In Ancient Times, Camels Carried Wise Men.” The ad reader would supposedly supply the converse. The legend among hucksters is that Reynolds has avoided using the first half because it feared American Tobacco would supply the second half in its ads: “In Modern Times, Wise Men Carry Luckies.”