ABSTRACT
Professions occupy a position of great importance in America; they influence the relationships between individuals and their work and between their work and society.1 The tendency toward professionalization began to emerge in the United States around 1840; occupations as widely varied as baseball, morticians, and private detectives sought to join law, medicine, and the clergy as recognized professions.2 Beginning in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, advertising too sought the credibility, authority, and “job security” that comes with professional stature. Earliest efforts sought primarily to distance advertising work from the hucksterism so characteristic of its founders: P. T. Barnum and “snake oil” salesmen hawking patent medicines (Dr. Winslow’s Soothing Syrup: “Makes ’em lay like the dead ’til morning” 3). The introduction of the rationality and rhetoric of science to the practice of advertising became the “scientific advertising” movement.4 Among other early efforts undertaken by practitioners to attain professional stature were:
n The formation of local clubs and national associations, which served to bring the community together, foster a sense of self-identification and recognition, and “announce” the existence of the profession to clients and the broader public.5
