Shepherd Mead
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Shepherd Mead, born Edward Shepherd Mead IV, (April 26, 1914-August 15, 1994), was an American writer.
He is best known as the author of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, which was adapted into a hit Broadway show and motion picture.
Mead, a native of St. Louis, left the Benton & Bowles advertising agency in 1951 to pursue a writing career. He wrote How to Succeed in 100 hours while on vacation on Cape Cod.
How to Succeed, published in 1952, satirized contemporary office life in the United States in the guise of a self-help book. Its subtitle was "The dastard's guide to fame and fortune."
The book was a best-seller, and in 1961 it was adapted into a musical by Frank Loesser, with book by Abe Burrows. The play starred Robert Morse as the young striver J. Pierrepont Finch and Rudy Vallee as the company president J.W. Biggley.
The play was a smash hit, with a Broadway run of 1417 performances between October 1961 and March 1965. It won eight Tony Awards and the 1962 Pulitzer Prize for best drama. It was adapted into a movie, also starring Morse and several from the Broadway cast, in 1967. It was successfully revived on Broadway in 1995, starring Matthew Broderick as Finch.
Mead went on to write 19 novels. Later in life he settled in Great Britain.
[edit] A quote
"Not even computers will replace committees, because committees buy computers."
--Shepherd Mead, quoted in the Wall Street Journal, June 18, 1964.