drawing, done late in 1942, was never formally published, but it was clearly the most dramatic. Under the magazine’s advertising slogan was an image of Adolf Hitler giving a “Heil Hitler” salute juxtaposed against an image of the majestic Statue of Liberty proudly lifting her Torch of Freedom high.
Leo Lionni, 1942. Used with permission from the Lionni family.
Lionni’s pivotal role in the Ladies’ Home Journal advertising campaign served as a springboard for a spectacular career. He went on to become an influential art director, an acclaimed fine artist, and, later in life, an internationally renowned author of children’s books. It all started in 1939, though, with what he described in his 1997 autobiography Between Worlds as, “My legendary stroke of luck when I rescued a line of copy from a wastepaper basket.”
It is because of Leo Lionni’s efforts that Never underestimate the power of a woman became a successful corporate slogan. But what was it about the saying that made it an American catchphrase? Perhaps it simply reflected the increased role women played in American life after the 19th Amendment gave them the vote in 1920. Or perhaps it was a concrete way of honoring the many pioneering role models—like Amelia Earhart, Babe Didrikson Zaharias, and Eleanor Roosevelt—who were often featured in the pages of the magazine. Or maybe it was simply a case of perfect timing. The saying, after all, became popular at the time many women—like “Rosie the Riveter”—contributed to the war effort by taking jobs that had previously been held only by men. Like so many popular advertising slogans, there was a delightful vagueness about the precise meaning of the saying—and that vagueness may have helped to boost its popularity.
And, not surprisingly, with the success of the saying came a legion of spin-offs penned by authors whose names have been lost to history:
Never underestimate the power of love.
Never underestimate the power of forgiveness.
Never underestimate the power of a single vote.
Never underestimate the power of simple courtesy.
Never underestimate the value of a firm handshake.
Never underestimate the cunning of your opponent.
Never underestimate the power of a kind word or deed.
Never underestimate the importance of a first impression.
While the foregoing observations have a slightly cliched quality, there are many others that are deeply inspirational, especially when we understand the context in which they were made or the background of the person offering the thought.
Never underestimate the power of dreams
and the influence of the human spirit.
Wilma Rudolph said this shortly after the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome. The first American to win three track-and-field gold medals, she added: “We are all the same in this notion: The potential for greatness lives within each of us.” During the 1960 games, Rudolph’s story captured the attention of the world. Born twenty years earlier into a poor Tennessee family, she was the twentieth of twenty-two children. A sickly child whose early life was plagued by scarlet fever, pneumonia, and polio, she wore leg braces until she was nine. She once recalled, “My doctors told me I would never walk again. My mother told me I would. I believed my mother.” Inspired by her mother’s words, young Wilma shed her braces and by age twelve was running faster than all the boys her age. She went on to become a star high school athlete and, after joining the track team at Tennessee State University, a world-class sprinter.
In addition to the danger of underestimating things, warnings about the exact opposite problem have been attributed to two famous Americans:
Never overestimate the taste of the American public.P. T. BARNUM
Never overestimate the intelligence of the American people.H. L. MENCKEN
While these sayings have never been found in the writings or remarks of Barnum and Mencken, they continue to be repeated—in part because they capture the essence of the two cultural icons, but also because the never overestimate phrase so succinctly paves the way for a memorable conclusion.
Still other people have managed, often in quite memorable ways, to combine the problems of underestimating and overestimating in the same thought:
Never underestimate your power to change yourself.
Never overestimate your power to change others.H. JACKSON BROWN JR. in Life’s Little Instruction Book (1991)
In preparing your speeches,
you will do well to adapt the news reporters’ code:
“Never overestimate the information of your audience;
never underestimate the intelligence of your audience.”STEPHEN LUCAS, in The Art of Public Speaking (1986)
Never underestimate your own intelligence,
and never overestimate the intelligence of others.DAVID J. SCHWARTZ, in The Magic of Thinking Big (1987)
In the remainder of the chapter, you’ll find a wide variety of additional never underestimate and never overestimate quotations. As you read on, don’t be surprised if you get the itch to create a few of your own original observations. It’s a kind of fill-in-the-blanks phenomenon that you can easily observe for yourself. The next time you go to a party, challenge your fellow partiers to come up with witty or creative endings to a sentence that begins with the words Never underestimate. When the contributions on that topic die down, do the same thing with Never overestimate. Be prepared for some howls of laughter along with a few groans here and there, and don’t be surprised if a few contributions veer off in a raunchy direction. But it should all be great fun, and you can experience the enjoyment of knowing that the fun you’re having can be traced to Leo Lionni’s accidental discovery of a slip of paper in a wastepaper basket a little more than seventy years ago.
Never underestimate the cleaning power
of a 94-year-old chick with a French name.ADVERTISING SLOGAN, Bon Ami scouring powder, 1980
Since 1886, the red-and-yellow cans of Bon Ami scouring powder have appeared with an image of a newly hatched chick (it is still the product’s trademark image). In 1901, the slogan “Hasn’t scratched yet” was added to the mix, and over the years many attempts were made to make sure that American consumers knew bon ami was French for “good friend.” In an effort to revive sagging sales in 1980, the company came out with this slogan, an obvious spin-off of the famous Ladies’ Home Journal slogan.
