The Billion Dollar Failure of Figger Fallup

The CBS radio workshop dedicated to man's imagination, the theater of the mind. Tonight we present the mythical saga of a modern seer, a true tycoon of facts and figures, a moulder as well as encyclopedist of public opinion. A man who, for more than a generation, had reason to pride himself in knowing what people thought and wanted, even before they actually thought or wanted.

A man whose every news release has been awaited with eager interest by Poppers and Presidents. A man whose pronouncements have often helped to shape national policy, crystallize business trends, and change the thinking habits of our people.

A man, however, who, one day, accepted an assignment from the Lord of the Nether Regions, and proved only fallible after all. The title? The Billion Dollar Failure of Figure Fallip. Our story centers in one of the many tall, teeming buildings which seem to reach for the sky from each side of New York's Madison Avenue.

The building is one of those which house some of the world's most influential advertising and public relations offices. Those business concerns, which so effectively, persuade so many millions of us to change from white toothpaste to yellow, from yellow to green, and then again back to white.

Firms which maintain headquarters in this building have made America filter tip conscious, your children into eating nourishing foods, and help to convince women that they would be out of style if they didn't either raise or lower their hemlines each year.

The accounts of some of these firms run into tens of millions of dollars. There is one whole floor in our particular building, however, which is occupied by an organization devoted to an entirely different form of enterprise.