‘How to Win Friends and Influence People’ : Best Seller Turns 50, but Its Advice Is Timeless

At the height of the Great Depression, a middle-age man from Missouri who taught public speaking at a New York YMCA scoured the city’s libraries and bookstores for a textbook to accompany his courses.

Finding none, he wrote his own. That done, he handed the manuscript over to a student, who had persuaded him to let his employer, Simon & Schuster, publish the book. The man from Missouri, skeptical about its chances in the marketplace, bought the entire first printing of 5,000 copies and tucked them away in his attic.

For the author, Dale Carnegie, who had already parlayed a tireless energy and unwavering optimism into a series of successful careers, it was a most uncharacteristic act.

It was also unnecessary. Soon after it was published, “How to Win Friends and Influence People,” priced at $1.98, was selling 5,000 copies a day, thanks to a direct-mail campaign aimed at the nation’s businessmen.

Millions Sold

At last count, The Book, as those whose livelihoods revolve around it tend to call it, has sold more than 15 million hard-cover copies and has been translated into 40 languages. It remained a New York Times best seller for a decade. Last year, American Heritage magazine described it as one of 10 books that shaped the American character.

In sales, among nonfiction best sellers, it ranks close to the Bible. In influence, it ushered in a new era of self-help and human potential that continues to thrive. Its message, which threw a welcome spotlight into the dark recesses of American business and industry, was simple and upbeat: Nice guys, Carnegie believed, can indeed finish first.

“How to Win Friends” celebrates its 50th birthday in October. And although the man who wrote it has been dead for more than 30 years, Dale Carnegie & Associates, the organization that bears his name, continues to spread his gospel to a worldwide class in human relations. Students in 68 countries enroll in Dale Carnegie courses at a rate of more than 2,000 a week.

Those who have fallen under Carnegie’s influence number among the world’s most influential people.

Many Believers

Pope John Paul II is a disciple. Lee Iacocca quotes Carnegie. Walt Disney was a believer. So was Franklin D. Roosevelt.

J. Oliver Crom, Carnegie’s son-in-law and president of the company, says 400 of the Fortune 500 companies are paying customers of Dale Carnegie courses. His biggest accounts: the Big Three auto makers, IBM and AT&T.;

According to Crom, projections for the fiscal year that ends in August indicate new cause for celebration: Between 135,000 and 140,000 students will graduate from Carnegie courses, a new record for a single year.

“If you’re going to sell success, you should be successful,” says Crom, a genial man who greets each employee by name, in keeping with Carnegie principle No. 6: “Remember that a person’s name is to him or her the sweetest and most important sound in any language.”

Relevant Examples

Carnegie himself read The Book hundreds of times, Crom recalls. “He didn’t profess to have invented the principles. But he came as close to perfecting them as anyone I’ve ever known. I never once saw him angry.”

Crom believes the success of The Book lies in its use of relevant examples. Indeed, the 276-page paperback is peppered with them. Case histories run the gamut from the life of Abraham Lincoln, whom Carnegie studied extensively, to that of Al Capone, who contrary to public opinion saw himself as a kindhearted victim--as do most people. The message behind the examples, “Don’t criticize, condemn or complain,” is Principle No. 1, of which Crom says, “The only negative rule, and the hardest to follow.”

The others--”Become genuinely interested in other people,” “Smile,” “Be a good listener,” for instance--are equally timeless, which explains why, in its 50-year life span, The Book has been revised only once, in 1981.

Dale Carnegie, father of the modern self-help book, precursor of the human-potential movement and dean of American adult education, was clearly ahead of his time.

Grew Up Poor

His was the quintessential American success story.

Unlike his distant cousin Andrew (“of the rich Carnegies”), Dale Carnegie grew up poor on a farm in Maryville, Mo. As a kid, he picked strawberries for a nickel an hour. His mother, however, had plans for her son, and moved the family to Warrensburg, enabling Dale to attend the state teacher’s college.

He couldn’t afford to live on campus, so he commuted on horseback. That and his threadbare clothes, small stature and limited athletic ability contributed to an inferiority complex that he battled by making a name for himself as a college debater.

His early jobs after college were in sales. First, he hawked an international correspondence course with moderate success. When a fellow salesman told him he’d do better with a product people actually needed, he switched to bacon, soap and lard, transforming Armour & Co.’s worst sales territory, the Badlands of South Dakota, into the company’s biggest moneymaker within a year.

An Accomplished Hustler

With the $500 he saved as a star salesman, Carnegie moved to New York to try acting. He toured with a road show for a year, then decided to find a steady day job so he could write a novel at night.

Carnegie, already an accomplished hustler, persuaded the YMCA to let him teach public speaking at their 125th Street branch. He launched his teaching career in 1912, working on a $2-per-student commission.

The novel never materialized, but within three or four years he was successful enough as a teacher to afford his own office. Figuring the name couldn’t hurt, he moved his operation to Carnegie Hall. “The guy was no dummy,” says Crom.

About the same time, Lowell Thomas, then an associate professor of speech at Princeton University, came to Carnegie for help in putting together a travel talk on Alaska. Carnegie eventually became Thomas’ business manager, a job he held for several years.

Popularity Soared

He supplemented his income by writing a newspaper column and doing a syndicated radio show, consisting of interviews with celebrities. Carnegie knew precisely what his Depression-era listeners wanted to hear; his interviews zeroed in on successful people’s suggestions on how to get ahead. His popularity soared.

Several early books by Carnegie, including “Five-Minute Biographies” and “Little-Known Facts About Well-Known People,” were published by the YMCA press. The books, now out of print, didn’t exactly make their author rich, but they did help make him famous. Later, he followed up his blockbuster best seller with another successful book, “How to Stop Worrying and Start Living.”

Carnegie was among those who lost his shirt in the crash of ‘29, an experience that made him less apt to equate success with money. His first royalty check for The Book totaled $90,000. He waited three days to deposit it.

“For three days, he just sat there looking at it,” says Crom. “Finally, he said, ‘This would have meant so much to me years ago, when I could’ve helped my parents. Now, it doesn’t mean so much.’ ”

Ambivalence Toward Money

Years later, Dale Hill, a Carnegie course instructor in San Francisco who owed the company a sizable amount of money, received a note from the boss telling him the debt had been forgiven. Crom recalls, “Mr. Carnegie simply told him that he’d made enough money that year and didn’t need any more.”

His ambivalence toward money, coupled with his faith in humanity, occasionally led to poor investments. “He had such a belief in other people,” says Crom. “A sad story or an enthusiastic one would prompt him to reach into his wallet. He was always a soft touch.”

Dorothy Carnegie, whom he married in the mid ‘40s, “had all the business acumen he lacked,” says Crom. With her help, Carnegie began building the organization that now employs between 250 and 300 people at its homey headquarters in Garden City and its vast distribution center for course materials in nearby Hauppauge. Both are on New York’s Long Island, where Dorothy Carnegie still lives.

Another 3,000 to 4,000 people work throughout the world as licensed Dale Carnegie instructors, teaching the courses that since 1955 have helped more than 2.5 million people win friends.

Available in 18 Languages

The basic course, which now costs $700 and lasts 14 weeks, has been supplemented with additional training programs in customer relations, effective presentations, employee development and sales, among other areas.

The courses, available in 18 languages including Icelandic and Chinese, are accredited by the Accrediting Commission of the Council for Non-Collegiate Continuing Education.

Although the message has remained the same for 50 years, Crom says, the method has undergone some changes. “We’ve revised our methodology to adjust it to current culture,” he explains.

“Today, people are more advanced. They learn quicker. They’re not as provincial. And, of course, there are far more women taking our courses than there were years ago.”

Indeed. Dorothy Carnegie’s contribution to the self-help literature of the ‘50s is no longer in print. The title: “How to Help Your Husband Get Ahead.”