There's been a lot of heartbreak lately in the Chiat family. This includes the recently deceased Kathy Hepinstall as well as Steve Hayden. I feel like I'm forgetting someone else, but then I'm forgetting quite a bit more these days. Oh, I left my coffee cup in the kitchen.
I had a personal connection with Dave, who literally helped me forge my junior copywriter book about 193 years ago. I wanted to write a tribute to Dave Butler. And then I remembered I'd already done that about 13 years ago. Suffice it to say, he was a very special man who schooled me in copywriting. But also taught me the value of helping others get into and succeed in this crazy business of advertising.
My deepest condolences go out to his daughter Molly, who also worked at Chiat, and his friends and his family and the many, many people touched by the generosity of Dave.
Here then is my original thank you to Dave, from almost 13 years ago to the date:
https://roundseventeen.blogspot.com/2012/10/do-not-enter.html
1 comment:
We all look back at missed opportunities. One of mine was picking Dave's brain, and developing a friendship with someone so well liked and respected.
Unlike some of you who met him early in your careers, I went to work at Chiat after I my typewriter, then computer, became adept at generating admirable concepts and text. However, I realized that one of the perks of working at Chiat was getting to know Dave; so my first day on the job I went on a walkabout, looking for his stall. (For those of you who missed out on
the raucous atmosphere in the Venice Beach warehouse building, we had plywood and 2" x 4" "offices," four feet high. Hence, "stall.") Ten minutes into my search I found him, writing away. Unlike any of the other stalls, however, he had constructed a cardboard door. It was clear he didn't want to be disturbed, and so I continued on. Years earlier, when I had slept with CA Annuals hoping to become a talent any way possible, including via osmosis, Dave's ads were among my favorites. Like people who grow up in New York, and never visit the Statue of Liberty because, "What's the rush? I can do that anytime," I never did meet him. A year and a half after landing in L.A. I was back in Chicago ad-making with old friends. There's no denying he had an impact on many of us, including those who never met him. Thank you, David.
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