A History of Marketing / Episode 6

This week we are joined by Shelley Spector, founder and director of the Museum of Public Relations. Shelley's journey into PR history began with an unlikely friendship with the legendary Edward Bernays, the "father of public relations" and nephew of Sigmund Freud.

In our conversation, Shelley shares personal stories of Bernays in his later years, and we use the Museum of Public Relations as a lens to explore PR's early history.

I'm releasing this episode right after last week’s conversation with Larry Tye on the historic life of Eddie Bernays. If you haven't heard that one yet, I suggest listening to that one first, as it will give you richer context for Shelley Spector's personal stories about Eddie Bernays later in his life.

But this conversation isn't just about Bernays. Shelley also highlights the often-overlooked contributions of women to PR, such as Doris Fleischman, Barbara Hunter, Inez Kaiser, and more.

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Read the interview transcript, enhanced with links, images, and videos:

Note: This text is from a recorded conversation transcribed with AI. I have read it to check for mistakes, but it is possible that there are errors that I missed.

Andrew Mitrak: Shelley Spector, thanks so much for joining me.

Shelley Spector: Thank you for having me, Andrew.

Edward Bernays and Founding the Museum of Public Relations

Andrew: To start, what inspired you to found a museum dedicated to public relations?

Shelley: It's kind of a long story, but it grew out of our friendship with Eddie Bernays. He lived until 103 and a half, in a mansion outside of Boston, a mile from Harvard. One day, I happened to ask, "What are you going to do with all this stuff when you need to leave?"

He immediately said, "I want to turn it into a museum. I want to turn my house into a museum." He was picturing what Freud's family had done in London. When Freud passed away, his children made his entire house into a Freud Museum. We've been there, and it's wonderful.

I said to Eddie, "I understand where you're coming from, but, no offense, PR is not recognized as broadly as psychology is. Your uncle Freud was a little more famous than you were." He looked really sad when I said this. So I said, "How about we build a museum of public relations in New York?"

He said, "Will you?" And I said, "Yes. It's not going to be an Eddie Bernays Museum; it will be a museum for the whole field."

When Eddie died, the family called us. We came up and walked around from room to room to select those items and papers that we thought were important to have in the museum. We loaded up the truck and drove home, without having a home for the museum yet.

Andrew: We released an episode where I interviewed Larry Tye about his book, The Father of Spin, which was all about Eddie Bernays. For listeners who haven't heard that episode yet, he's just this fascinating person who had all this impact on the world. It sounds like he inspired your Museum. The reason we have bacon for breakfast, bookshelves built into homes, UPS trucks being painted brown, and calling multiple sclerosis "MS"—all these things, including your museum, originate from Eddie Bernays' brain.

You mentioned his being inspired by his uncle, Sigmund Freud. He had a very interesting relationship with Freud, and he was also Freud's nephew in two ways: his mother was Freud's sister, and his father's sister was Freud's wife.

Shelley: Exactly.

Andrew: Can you share more about what inspired him about Freud's museum? Had he visited it before?

Shelley: No, he never went to the museum because he only visited with Freud while Freud was alive. The Freud Museum was built in 1938, after Freud had died. But while Eddie was still a child, his parents would go on vacation in the Austrian Alps. We have pictures of Eddie at age nine with Freud, who had a brown beard, which you don't really get to see.

You can imagine growing up in a household where all they're talking about is Freud and his crazy theories of psychoanalysis. Psychoanalysis wasn't yet adopted in the US. Eddie and Freud were very close; they wrote letters back and forth. Those letters are now preserved at the Library of Congress.

At some point in the 20s, after World War I, Freud wrote to Eddie, "I need a way to make some money. I don't have any money" because of the hyperinflation. He wanted Eddie to perhaps send him some money. Eddie did manage to send him cigars from Cuba, brought over by another PR pioneer named Carl Byoir.

But Eddie proposed to Freud, "Why don't I get your book, Introductory Lectures on Psycho-Analysis, translated? And have you come over here? We'll do a media tour." It's a classic response from a PR person. It was very much Eddie's work that got Freud to be known as much as he is known now.

So, he had the book translated by a disciple of Freud named A.A. Brill. The book was very popular. Eddie wanted Freud to write byline articles that Eddie would help him write for the popular press, but Freud was saying, "Americans are not going to get it. They're not going to get psychoanalysis. We're talking to an audience of people that are really not that smart and cultured." He really looked down on the US.

Eddie could not get him to come here and sit for interviews with the Times or with Life magazine or Fortune. However, the ideas, because they were so big and relevant at the time, those ideas of Freud spread. And behind the scenes, you have the nephew, always behind the scenes.

Befriending Eddie Bernays: A Personal Connection to PR's Past

Andrew: Eddie is this fascinating character, not just in PR, but in history in general, in the 20th century. You met him and knew him before you founded the museum. What was it like first meeting him? What was his personality? Any stories or anecdotes about meeting Eddie Bernays?

Shelley: You have to remember that during that time—this was the mid-80s—there were trade publications in PR that frequently covered Eddie and his gallivanting around the city with various women. This is how everybody got to know who he was, besides knowing his campaigns. On one side, you had all these campaigns that were being taught in the schools, and on the other side, you had this 90-something-year-old man who was said to be quite an adventurer with women in Cambridge.

The series of events were that I was asked to give a seminar at the Doral Hotel, where there were a bunch of PR seminars being given on that day. One of them, right next door, was Eddie's. He had been giving these seminars called "Two Days with Edward L. Bernays."

After the first day of the seminar, I went, stood outside his class, and I introduced myself. One of the first questions he asked me was, "Do you want to have dinner at the Waldorf?"

Of course, I would love to have dinner, but I also don't want to wind up in the trade publication, being seen by paparazzi.

Andrew: Just to remind, Eddie at this point is probably in his 90s, right?

Shelley: He's 94.

Andrew: 94, wow. Okay.

Shelley: And so I said, "Can I call somebody to join us for dinner?" And he said, "By all means."

The previous Sunday, I was on a bike trip, and I met this guy that I kind of liked. I had his phone number, and I called him from a pay phone. The fellow that I called was a graphic designer, knew nothing about Bernays. I said, "But he's very interesting. He's very historical. He's 94. He's worked with every president of the century. Please come to dinner at the Waldorf."

So he was intrigued. Well, that guy turned out to be my husband and business partner all these years, Barry. Barry just could not—his mouth was agape while listening to Eddie talking about working with Calvin Coolidge's reelection campaign and bringing Al Jolson down to the White House. Stuff that made somebody who didn't know him question, "Is this guy senile?"

Barry and I said, "No, all this stuff is true." And so Barry then said to me, "If this stuff is true, then we've got to go up to his house and do an oral history." So I said, "Yes."

So it all worked out. We went that April to his house and started doing these...

Shelley Spector: Early Public Relations & Pioneers Who Shaped the Field