Borden Sees Important Role For Post War Advertising

For over a score of years, smiling Neil Hopper Borden, professor of Advertising, has been a familiar and happy sight around the Harvard business School campus. Himself a Business School grad, the professor was appointed as Assistant Dean and Instructor back in '22. Since then several thousand students, many of whom are today's top executives, have profited by his teaching. Now Professor Borden safely pilots a good percentage of the Business School military through the intricacies of marketing.

"The only essential difference between my students of today and those of a few years ago is their clothing," he said in an interview in his Morgan Hall office. "The men in uniform are doing fine work," he added enthusiastically.

From behind a pair of spectacles, Professor Borden's eyes twinkled as he recalled his role in the last World War. "My job then," he said, "was to weed out the mentally deficient from the draftees." (Army and Navy men under Professor Bordens' charge, please note.)

Forming a fitting background for the popular professor as he spoke, the walls of his office were lined with books on marketing and advertising. One of these books, "The Economic Effects of Advertising," written by Professor Borden himself, is considered an outstanding work in the field. "Business Week" described it as being "an invaluable source-book for practically everything having to do with the art." The book runs into over 1,000 pages of deep thinking.

"I had been carrying around with me the idea for the book for nearly 20 years. Late in '37 I was finally able to get started through a grant of $30,000. For four years a full-time staff of research assistants and myself assembled statistical data on every phase of advertising. It was a back-breaking job." Professor Borden meant what he said.