ABSTRACT
Selling the industrial town was intended to be a down-to-earth, matter-of-fact business. There was, certainly, a recognized need to attract attention. Yet there was also a pervasive belief that campaigns which were too flashy might be counterproductive. The view was that the prospective new employer would be more convinced by an accumulation of relevant and accurate facts than by the beguiling imagery that was the essence of the tourist poster or the suburban advertisement. This, certainly, was the opinion endorsed by two of the most sophisticated place promotional agencies of the late nineteenth century, Atlanta’s City Council and Chamber of Commerce. On the title page of their Hand Book of the City of Atlanta (Atlanta, 1898), they made absolutely sure the reader did not miss the point by quoting from Shakespeare’s Richard III: ‘An honest tale speeds best being plainly told’.
