Read Online The Golden Willow by Harry Bernstein - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Harry Bernstein
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was sending me a check for a hundred dollars, and would I care to have lunch with him and discuss the possibility of doing further work for his magazine?
I was stunned. A hundred bucks! It was three times what any of the bigger magazines had paid me. And would I have lunch with him? Yes, I said, and did everything I could to keep my voice steady.
Fortunately, we had a car then, a 1950 Studebaker Champion that we had treated ourselves to before the collapse of the movie industry, and I was able to drive out to New Jersey. I was in for a surprise. Considering the skinny little bit of a magazine that I had become involved with, I expected a cubbyhole of an office. Instead, it occupied an entire floor at the top of a five-story office building. And there were quite a number of girls bent over typewriters clattering away, a receptionist, everything.
Myron Hallerman's private office was large and impressive, with paneled walls, a comfortable black leather sofa and chairs, and an enormous glass-topped mahogany desk behind which he sat in a high-backed carved chair that was like a throne. He was a big man, about my age, heavyset, with an aggressive, rather swarthy face and a hand outstretched to welcome me. “Glad you could come. Sit down. Have a drink?”
There was a liquor cabinet behind him—well stocked, I would discover later. But that time I shook my head and said, “No, thanks. It's a bit too early for me.”
It wasn't for him, but he didn't drink that time. We chatted for a while, I telling him about myself, my wife and children, my job as a reader for fifteen years, he telling me about himself, he too married with two children, boy and girl, which gave us something in common to start with.
We hit it off at the start, but even more so in the restaurant, where he seemed to be well known. We were seated in a booth and well tended by an attractive young waitress who smiled a lot at him and didn't mind when he patted her buttocks. I had two martinis and he two Scotches before steaks were served, and we talked a lot, he telling me that he'd graduated from an ivy league school, but instead of becoming the doctor his parents wanted him to be, he'd becomea salesman, selling every goddamn thing there was to sell, as he put it in the gravelly voice. He loved selling, especially when it involved the challenge of selling things that people didn't want and he was able to talk them into buying. And then finally he hit on the toughest of all things to sell: a magazine.
The postwar building boom had given him the inspiration. He'd just come back from the war with a bit of money in his pocket that he'd won at crap games, and was looking for a business of his own. He devised
Your Dream Home
, a magazine that a builder could send out to prospective home buyers to whet their appetite for a home still further and lure them into the builder's office. It would appear to be the builder's own personal magazine, with his name on the front cover and all sorts of advice inside on how to decorate and furnish the home.
“And it doesn't cost the builder a dime,” Myron explained to me, leaning forward across the table and tapping my arm to emphasize this point. “Not a goddamn dime.”
“Then who pays for it?” I asked, aware that he wanted me to ask this question.
“The guys on the back cover,” Myron said, grinning a little. “They're his subcontractors, and they'd better come across or else they can look for work elsewhere. Although,” he added, perhaps seeing me wince, “they get their money's worth in the business the magazine brings. And it only costs 'em ten dollars a month for the ad, which is peanuts compared to what they get back. It works for everybody, including me, of course.”
“How many of these builders do you have?” I asked.
“It started out with one a year ago,” Myron said. “I ran around the country selling my head off before I got that one, and then it took off like a rocket, and I've quit selling myself
I was stunned. A hundred bucks! It was three times what any of the bigger magazines had paid me. And would I have lunch with him? Yes, I said, and did everything I could to keep my voice steady.
Fortunately, we had a car then, a 1950 Studebaker Champion that we had treated ourselves to before the collapse of the movie industry, and I was able to drive out to New Jersey. I was in for a surprise. Considering the skinny little bit of a magazine that I had become involved with, I expected a cubbyhole of an office. Instead, it occupied an entire floor at the top of a five-story office building. And there were quite a number of girls bent over typewriters clattering away, a receptionist, everything.
Myron Hallerman's private office was large and impressive, with paneled walls, a comfortable black leather sofa and chairs, and an enormous glass-topped mahogany desk behind which he sat in a high-backed carved chair that was like a throne. He was a big man, about my age, heavyset, with an aggressive, rather swarthy face and a hand outstretched to welcome me. “Glad you could come. Sit down. Have a drink?”
There was a liquor cabinet behind him—well stocked, I would discover later. But that time I shook my head and said, “No, thanks. It's a bit too early for me.”
It wasn't for him, but he didn't drink that time. We chatted for a while, I telling him about myself, my wife and children, my job as a reader for fifteen years, he telling me about himself, he too married with two children, boy and girl, which gave us something in common to start with.
We hit it off at the start, but even more so in the restaurant, where he seemed to be well known. We were seated in a booth and well tended by an attractive young waitress who smiled a lot at him and didn't mind when he patted her buttocks. I had two martinis and he two Scotches before steaks were served, and we talked a lot, he telling me that he'd graduated from an ivy league school, but instead of becoming the doctor his parents wanted him to be, he'd becomea salesman, selling every goddamn thing there was to sell, as he put it in the gravelly voice. He loved selling, especially when it involved the challenge of selling things that people didn't want and he was able to talk them into buying. And then finally he hit on the toughest of all things to sell: a magazine.
The postwar building boom had given him the inspiration. He'd just come back from the war with a bit of money in his pocket that he'd won at crap games, and was looking for a business of his own. He devised
Your Dream Home
, a magazine that a builder could send out to prospective home buyers to whet their appetite for a home still further and lure them into the builder's office. It would appear to be the builder's own personal magazine, with his name on the front cover and all sorts of advice inside on how to decorate and furnish the home.
“And it doesn't cost the builder a dime,” Myron explained to me, leaning forward across the table and tapping my arm to emphasize this point. “Not a goddamn dime.”
“Then who pays for it?” I asked, aware that he wanted me to ask this question.
“The guys on the back cover,” Myron said, grinning a little. “They're his subcontractors, and they'd better come across or else they can look for work elsewhere. Although,” he added, perhaps seeing me wince, “they get their money's worth in the business the magazine brings. And it only costs 'em ten dollars a month for the ad, which is peanuts compared to what they get back. It works for everybody, including me, of course.”
“How many of these builders do you have?” I asked.
“It started out with one a year ago,” Myron said. “I ran around the country selling my head off before I got that one, and then it took off like a rocket, and I've quit selling myself
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