Victor O. Schwab

(1898-1980)

Schwab & Beatty, New York

Schwab, shorthand secretary for Ruthrauff & Ryan's Maxwell Sackheim in 1917, so improved Sackheim's copy that he was promoted to copywriter and went on to be hailed "the greatest mail-order copywriter of all time." A copy research pioneer, Schwab would use his coded coupon ads to test headlines, copy appeals, length, layouts, action closings and split runs of ads. He created Sunday comics ads for Dale Carnegie, body-builder Charles Atlas and Sherwin Cody's English Classics Course. In 1926, Schwab and Robert Beatty bought out Sackheim & Scherman and went on to build the giant Book-of-the-Month Club.