Bruce Fairchild Barton (August 5, 1886-July 5, 1967) was a U.S. Congressman and New York advertising executive. The son of Congregational Church pastor, Bruce Barton was born in Robbins, Tennessee, and grew up in Oak Park, Illinois. He was editor of his high school paper and was a reporter for a local newspaper. After graduating from Amherst College in 1907, he became editor of the Home Herald and Housekeeper. In 1912, he became assistant sales manager at P.F. Collier and Son in New York City, where his advertisements for the Harvard Classics series resulted in sales of 400,000 copies.
In 1914, Barton edited Every Week magazines, then during World War I managed publicity for the United War Work Campaign.
In 1919, Barton formed the advertising agency, later known as Batten, Barton, Durstine, and Osborne, with cliets such as: United States Steel, General Electric, General Motors, and General Mills, the later for which he created "Betty Crocker."
Barton wrote magazine articles and newspaper columns filled with optimism and success which were compiled in his books: More Power to You (1919), Better Days (1924), and On the Up and Up (1929).
His best-selling book was The Man Nobody Knows (1925), which retold the Gospel with Jesus as a dynamic young executive who "picked up twelve men from the bottom ranks of business and forged them into an organization that conquered the world," in contrast to the "sissified" image of Jesus presented in the Sunday schools.
Barton backed his fellow Amherst alumnus, Calvin Coolidge, for President. Barton was elected to Congress in 1937, representing Manhattan for two terms. He ran for Senate, but was defeated, in part, by Franklin Roosevelt's targeting.
Barton's advertising help make household names out of Lever Brothers, Campbell Soup, and Revlon.
In The Book Nobody Knows, 1926, Bruce Barton wrote:
<In the 18th century, that vitriolic genius, Voltaire, spoke of the Bible as a short-lived book. He said that within a hundred years it would pass from common use. Not many people read Voltaire today, but his house has been packed with Bibles as a depot of a Bible society.> 1886BB001
<The Bible rose to the place it now occupies because it deserved to rise to that place, and not because God sent anybody with a box of tricks to prove its divine authority.> 1886BB002
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American Quotations by William J. Federer, 2024, All Rights Reserved, Permission granted to use with acknowledgement.
Endnotes:
1886BB001. William J. Federer, American Quotations (2014). Bruce Barton, statement. Tryon Edwards, D.D., The New Dictionary of Thoughts-A Cyclopedia of Quotations (Garden City, NY: Hanover House, 1852; revised and enlarged by C.H. Catrevas, Ralph Emerson Browns and Jonathan Edwards [descendent, along with Tryon, of Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758), president of Princeton], 1891; The Standard Book Company, 1955, 1963), pp. 46-47.
1886BB002. William J. Federer, American Quotations (2014). Bruce Barton, statement. Tryon Edwards, D.D., The New Dictionary of Thoughts-A Cyclopedia of Quotations (Garden City, NY: Hanover House, 1852; revised and enlarged by C.H. Catrevas, Ralph Emerson Browns and Jonathan Edwards [descendent, along with Tryon, of Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758), president of Princeton], 1891; The Standard Book Company, 1955, 1963), p. 47.