"Increasingly, the future…will depend upon activities not directly related to the sale of life insurance. The future of the agency system may rest on the activities of such committees as Public Service, Public Relations, Federal Law and Legislation, State Law and Legislation, and others."

—C. Carney Smith

THE H STREET BUILDING faced a tree-shaded square intersected by Pennsylvania Avenue, a few blocks west of the White House. Schriver and his staff occupied the entire tenth floor. The LUTC occupied the floor above. The arrangement was symbolic as well as practical. Though relations between staff members were amicable enough, on the official level the LUTC had found it necessary to reaffirm its independence. Only a few months before the move to Washington, the two organizations had settled their long dispute over student eligibility. Among Association leaders there had been strong sentiment of restricting enrollment in LUTC courses to members of life underwriters associations. Even though both the NALU ad the LUTC boards had issued calls urging LUTC instructors to recruit members for the sponsoring associations in their classes, the LUTC leadership was adamant that enrollment be kept as open as possible. The situation grew tense until finally in December 1955, the two organizations issue a joint statement to local presidents over the signature of the NALU president Stanley Collins making it clear that Association membership was not a prerequisite for enrollment. He pointed out that the program was institutional in nature, jointly sponsored and initially financed not only by the NALU but also by the American Life Convention, the Life Insurance Agency Management Association and the Life Insurance Association of America. The agreement noted that "more than 275 companies provide LUTC scholarships for their field men who enroll." It would be wrong, the agreement stated, to ask the companies to discriminate among the members of their field forces in awarding these scholarships. Declaring that the LUTC courses must remain accessible to all, the agreement concluded:

In order that there may be the fullest possible cooperation between the two organizations, however, LUTC will employ as instructors in classes sponsored by NALU's local associations only those persons who are members of NALU, unless such instructors are not eligible for membership in such local associations; provided that any instructor nominated by a local association must meet all qualifications for instructors established by LUTC. Moreover, to the extent consistent with the above recited points, LUTC agrees that it will use its best efforts to encourage its students to seek membership in NALU.

Finally, it is mutually agreed that all staff members representing both NALU and LUTC shall exercise every reasonable effort to promote the interests of both organizations.[i]

There were also some very practical reasons for the LUTC occupying all 4,656 square feet of the 11th floor at 1800 H Street. The program had grown enormously during the nine years since its foundation. With over 16,000 students enrolled in 826 classes in 1956, the Council's Managing Director Loran Powell and his staff of nearly thirty needed that space. Expanding insurance markets and the popularity of the LUTC courses dictated additions in curriculum as well as personnel. What was later more generally termed "health insurance" was usually called sickness and accident insurance at this time. As the companies during the 1950's continued developing improved plans for this type of coverage, life insurance agents made an aggressive entry into this field. Responding to the need for more expert knowledge of its marketing potential, in the summer of 1956, Powell hired Thomas B. Baugher, formerly of the Berkshire Life in Baltimore, to assist in developing an accident and sickness course.

A number of staff members had followed their jobs to Washington. After the move, John T. Coggins, Jr., a former field underwriter form Newark, New Jersey, replaced Pasquale Quarto as director of training. IN 1957 there were 17,526 men and women enrolled in 804 first and second year LUTC Life classes, and 112 in the Accident and Sickness classes, in every state in the Union, Alaska, Hawaii, Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia. That summer three young administrative assistants were added to the executive staff: Merritt L. Schriver (Lester Schriver's son); Warwick M. Carter, formerly an agent with the Penn Mutual in Washington; and John B. O'Day, who had been a brokerage manager for the Prudential in Washington. Commenting on its ten-year history of service to the industry, Eleanor Dowling wrote, "The Life Underwriter Training Council had become a power in and a pride to the life insurance industry. Even more important, it had become a stepping stone to increased production for more than 75,000 field underwriters. And all this in the short space of ten years!"[ii]

The move had occasioned some changes in Schriver's staff, as well. Eleanor Dowling decided to remain in New York where she joined the editorial staff of Medical Economics. During the year following the NALU's settling in the nation's capital, Herbert G. Keene joined the staff as business manager, Elsie Johnson became cashier, Hal Currier (whose background was acting) was put in charge of membership promotion and George Wittie was hired as supervisor of membership records. In 1959 Johnson's title was changed to comptroller, and Lee P. Derkay joined the staff as administrative assistant.

In October 1956 Donald A. Baker was named executive director of the General Agents and Managers Conference. At one time he had served as director or the Indianapolis Association of Life Underwriters. More recently, Baker had been managing editor of The Insurance Salesman, a trade journal based in Indianapolis. His task would not be a light one. This was a rapidly growing organization. During the next year, membership in the GAMC exceeded the 3,000 mark. By the end of the decade Nancy K. Grobert replaced Baker and the Conference had 155 local units with a total membership of 5,516.

September 1956 marked the fiftieth anniversary of Life Association News. Also celebrating its fiftieth birthday was the 8,300 member Life Underwriters Association of Canada, which had recently instituted its own "Life Underwriters Association Training Course." Not only was their program inspired by the American LUTC courses, but Powell and his staff supplied the Canadians with texts and instructional materials to get their program started. In an article appearing in Life Association News in 1958, Leslie W. Dunstall, executive vice president of the Canadian association, commented, "The impact of LUTC on the LUATC program in Canada is obvious; so is the effect today of LUATC on the Canadian Life insurance scene. So we in Canada once more say 'many thanks' to our American brethren for lending a helping hand and inspiration in our common cause to serve the public better."[iii]

During the NALU convention at Washington's Statler Hotel in late September the Membership Committee reported there were 668 local associations affiliated with the NALU having a membership totaling nearly 65,000. Griffin M. Lovelace, a pioneer insurance educator, received the Russell award for that year. During his long career Lovelace had headed agent training programs for both Connecticut Mutual Life and New York Life, but it was as the organizer of the life insurance school at Carnegie Institute that he is chiefly remembered. The delegates elected A. Jack Nussabum, agent for Massachusetts Mutual in Milwaukee, to serve as president. Born in Glasgow, Scotland, he was a fiddle-playing member of the MDRT, highly respected in the business and a faculty advisor to Purdue University's Institute of Life Insurance Marketing. "He was small in stature, proud of his Jewish ancestry and of his Jewish religion," Benjamin N. Woodson recalls, "He had a great sense of humor and a wonderful collection of stories, many of which I stole form him and still tell. He represented the personal producing agents and, although he was good at such things as trusts and wills and estates and the like, he could talk the language of the home service and of the average agent, which added to his popularity and helped make him a very effective president. I remember him very warmly."[iv]

Friday, September 28, was blustery, cool and damp in Washington but the several hundred Association leaders gathered on the C Street building lot for a ground-breaking ceremony didn't seem to mid. A number of dignitaries representing the federal government and civic organizations attended. Members of the press were there as well as a band and the Armed Forces Color Guard. Amid the flashing cameras Cleeton and Nussbaum each braved the cold to shovel symbolically where it was hoped more earnest earth-moving would soon be underway.

To coincide with the ground-breaking, the Building committee was pleased to have Marvin Kobel's publicity office and Sam Gaglio's staff combine forces to produce a special "New Building Issue" of Life Association News—"Marking the Construction of NALU's New Washington, D.C. Headquarters Building," according to the title page. Elegantly printed on high quality stock, this one-hundred-four-page book featured the architect's sketches of the proposed building—both interior and exterior—commendations form former Presidents Hoover and Truman, as well as President Eisenhower's congratulatory message, and testimonials from prominent industry leaders endorsing the NALU's aspirations for an impressive national headquarters housed in a structure of monumental design. Also included was a history of the building project, and Max Hoffamn contributed a historical sketch of the Association. "It is hoped," Kobel wrote, "that this special issue will be prized everywhere as souvenir that commemorates an eventful chapter in life insurance history and as a permanent record of the contributions of the American life insurance underwriter."

Events were to prove the agents' optimism about an early construction date premature. In July an article appearing In The Washington Post headed "State Department Plans Land annex Deal," had already informed the public:

The plan was explained during testimony to a House Appropriations subcommittee on State's request for $55.6 million to build an annex on four blocks bounded by C, E, 21st and 23d sts. Nw…

The planned land transaction involves the National Association of Life Underwriters and Conger's Laundry.

Starting in September, the underwriters plan to building an office building on the northeast corner of 22d and C Streets North West facing the proposed diplomatic entrance of the annex building. This is considered objectionable by both State and Federal building and planning officials.

The plan is for the Government to buy two lots on the south side of C Street, North West , between 22d and 23d now occupied by the laundry firm. General services Administration is requesting $300,000 to buy the lot….

The underwriters would then be permitted to build their building on the Conger property, in line with and to the rear of the American Pharmaceutical Association building which faced Constitution Avenue, North West, to the south. In return the underwriters would pay the $ 40,000 cost of leveling off the site they had planned for their office building.

The trade association also would pay the cost of upkeep of this section.[v]

By the beginning of the new year, however, construction had not begun and although the building fund campaign continue, there had been no transfer of land nor had the necessary building permits been issued. In March, at the midyear meeting in Roanoke, Virginia, Cleeton told the delegates, "When current agreements with the Federal Government concerning an exchange of parcels of land in Washington, D.C., are carried out, NALU expects to acquire within a reasonably short time one of the most desirable sites in the Nation's Capital for the new headquarters building and to begin construction soon after." The following September Life Association News informed is readers, "A larger site and an even more attractive location for NALU's new Washington, D.C. Headquarters Building is assured as a result of President Eisenhower's signing of Supplemental Appropriations Bill No. 1957." The bill provided funds for the State Department to buy the land adjoining the NALU's lot.

It was during the 1957 midyear meeting in Roanoke that the National council approved a proposal of the NALU Bylaws Committee that state life underwriters associations be admitted into membership in the NALU instead of being merely "affiliated" with the national organization. Gordon V. Hockaday of Spokane, Washington, chairman of the bylaws Committee, explained, "The intent of the proposed Article VI is to recognize State Associations in the NALU constitution without jeopardizing their autonomy within their State borders.' The amendment was subsequently adopted at the national convention in Detroit, on September 19, 1957.[vi]

May 1957 found many of the Association's leaders in the North Atlantic when the MDRT members injected an element of novelty into their annual meeting by holding it on board the Swedish-American line's Kungsholm. It was a chartered five-day cruise to Bermuda. Life Association News reported:

Luck was with the 460 MDRT members and their guests as they left the port of New York. Sailing under sunny skies and in calm seas, the "sailors" went "cabin hopping" to attend business meetings and listen to topnotch underwriters describe their techniques in selling life insurance, ranging form simple family protection to complex estate plans. In Bermuda, they spent two days sightseeing and playing golf.

Although MDRT membership this year hit an all-time high of 2,013 compared with last year's 1,557 committeemen in charge of the cruise had to turn down less than 50 members who wanted to go on the cruise. Space allocation had been made on a first-come, first-served basis.

Obviously, everyone thoroughly enjoyed the experiment. The MDRT used the Kungsholm again for their annual meeting in 1963. The organization ventured farther abroad in 1967 when these large volume life insurance salesmen and women devoted five days to a program of seminars, lectures and idea sessions in Lucerne, Switzerland.

The NALU's continued efforts to spread the Association movement internationally is evidenced by its wholehearted support of the two-year-old Puerto Rico Association's sponsorship of an Inter-American Conference at the Caribe-Hilton in San Juan on May 13-16, 1957. Besides trying to stimulate interest in forming associations in the Caribbean, representatives of the NALU, LUTC and other segments of the life insurance business met to consider the possibility of having an Inter-American Association of Life Underwriters, with a proposed membership drawn form the ranks of underwriters of both Latin and North American countries. Over a hundred life underwriters from both hemispheres attended. Thus encouraged, the group held a conference the following year in Miami.

Although no such international organization has yet been formed these meetings engendered much good will and occasioned the NALU's helpful influence in organizing life underwriters associations abroad. It is likely that the unstable political situation in the region during this period ultimately frustrated the life underwriters' plans for internationalism. Just weeks after Batista's flight from Cuba in January 1959, Life Association News announced that the third InterAmerican conference of Life Underwriters was scheduled for May 5-8 at the posh Havana Hilton. Noting the "growing interest in professionalism" among agents in Latin America, the Article explained:

The Havana meeting will, as in the past two years, attract delegates and visitors not only form Latin America but also from the Untied States and Canada. Speakers will examine problems facing the business, share ideas on how to sell life insurance, and discuss ways and means to advance their profession….

In fact, it is the goal of conference leaders to establish an organization similar to NALU and it affiliated local associations. These leaders look to NALU for counsel and direction in achieving their goal.

One NALU staffer who works closely with Conference leaders is Mrs. Ann Bickerton, director of field services. Recently she received a letter from conference president Joaquin Villodas Bird of Havana.

In his letter he assures her that despite the recent political turmoil Cuba the Havana meeting is expected to proceed normally. He writes that Cubans are now looking forward to an era of peace and stability.

"Sights of the new government," he points out, "have been set high toward a goal of better standards of honesty and service to the people. Men chosen for government positions are all known for their reliability and trustworthiness, and Cubans are putting their faith in them with high hopes."[vii]

Twenty-four U.S. representatives participated. Oren Pritchard, who was president of the NALU that year, took an active part as well as Bickerton, Loran Powell and NALU trustee R.B. Walker. Pritchard spoke on "Social functions of Life Insurance in America," and Walker presided at one of the morning sessions. All together there were 204 agents and managers from 12 Latin American countries, Canada and the United States. The group appointed a bylaws committee composed of a representative form each participating country and planned a July meeting for 1960 in Caracas, Venezuela. "Drawing up an acceptable set of bylaws has so far been the major stumbling block to the formation of an inter-American organization," Bickerton explained. "Political situations and modes of operation vary widely in each Latin America country. Any constitution and bylaws drawn up by even an non-political group, such as the life underwriters, should be acceptable to the various governments."[viii]

Years later Bickerton commented, "We made many wonderful friends there--highly successful agents, eager to raise the standards of life underwriting in their countries." (In the months following, a number of their Cuban friends found themselves in boats—refugees escaping political persecution.) The concept of an inter-American association remained alive for a while longer. Bickerton and others form North America participated in the Caracas meeting the following year. But that was the last one in which the NALU participated. Nevertheless, the inter-American conferences helped sow the seeds of the Association movement in the Caribbean and in other part of Latin America. Where the NALU was not actively involved, it at least served as a model. Since then, agents and agent groups of Latin America have attended NALU conventions and kept up an interest in the American organization's progress.

Life underwriters associations had a long history of promoting civic projects, contributing to local charities and encouraging community welfare efforts. Over the years members had generously given their time, money, and talent, using their influence in the community to support educational, cultural and artistic institutions in their region. More than once an association's organized efforts had saved a Community Chest campaign or a hospital building fund drive. Sometimes this civic-minded philanthropy was undertaken in conjunction with other institutional publicity projects, such as the annual Life Insurance Week. In 1957 the NALU joined the Institute of Life Insurance in giving formal recognition to this tradition with the institution of the Public Service Program. Early in the year, Dr. Louis I. Dublin, consultant on health and welfare a the Institute of Life Insurance, announced the first Annual Public Service Award to be given to three associations that merited recognition for outstanding contributions in "advancing the public welfare."

The original awards went to the life underwriters associations of Dallas, Omaha and Jonesboro (Arkansas). Dallas won top honors among large associations for its educational and fund raising "Cancer Crusade." Omaha won first place among medium sized associations for training volunteer solicitors in the city's United Fund campaign. Jonesboro topped the small association entries by having all its fifty-two members participate in the County Heat Fund drive. In presenting the awards at the NALU's annual convention that September, Dublin said, "What is particularly gratifying to all of us is the favorable reaction from the leaders of the communities served. Again and again we have been told that insurance men and women are the backbone of the effort when local campaigns of civic betterment are launched."[*]

Nearly 2,400 attended the convention in Detroit that year. Philadelphia's Albert C. Adams, general agent for John Hancock, became National Association president. "He was a polished, elegant gentleman who could have stepped onto the floor of the Senate of the United States, be introduced to a senator form Pennsylvania and be perfectly at home," Woodson remarks. "He had the dignity, the bearing, the appearance, the vocabulary, and the intellect. He was an impressive fellow." Adams would be called upon to demonstrate these leadership qualities before his term was over. The year, fraught with controversy, required a steadying hand and a calm voice to keep the organization on an even keel.

Early in 1958, the NALU came forward to speak out for the home service agent and asked Congress to amend the Internal Revenue Code clarifying the debit agent's status as an "outside salesman." The NALU had been instrumental in getting the "outside salesman" clause written into law in 1954, but subsequent decisions had barred the debit agent from this consideration. Testifying before the House Ways and Means Committee, John Z. Schneider of Baltimore, chairman of the NALU's Committee on Federal Law and Legislation, argued these agents should be allowed to deduct all of their ordinary and necessary business expensed form gross income for income tax purposes. Pointing out that the home service agent spent considerable time selling new insurance both inside and outside his assigned territory, Schneider added, "In every state, a debit agent must be licensed as a life insurance salesman, and, in virtually all states, he must qualify for and is given exactly the same type of license as the Ordinary agent (who is regarded by law as and 'outside salesman').[ix]

It was to be a long campaign. The NALU did not succeed in having the home service agent recognized as an "outside salesman" until 1965, after gaining the support of Representative Thomas B. Crutis of Missouri, a member of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee.

In March Life Association News informed its readers, "The life underwriter movement and the life insurance business suffered an irreparable loss on January 10 with the death of Ernest J. Clark, past president of the NALU, a former president of The American College of Life Underwriters, founder of Life Association News, and a life insurance field executive of renown." Reviewing Clark's long and distinguished career, the editors added, "No less than 14 agents who began their selling careers with Mr. Clark became managers or general agents. Among these 'Clark alumni' who have risen to high places are his nephew Paul J. Clark, former president of NALU and now chairman of the board of John Hancock; NALU president Albert C. Adams, and A.W. 'Dutch' Defenderfer, former Washington, D.C., general agent for John Hancock and now active as a personal producer."

Foreword by Alan Press, 1988-1989 NALU President

Preface by Jack E. Bobo, 1989 NALU Executive Vice President

Introduction

Acknowledgements

Chapter 1

Laying the Foundation—A Meeting at the Parker House

Leading Figures—Ransom, Carpenter, Blodgett and Plummer

Conditions Leading to the Foundation of the NALU

Rise of Modern Life Insurance and the General Agency System

Issues and Accomplishments of the First 15 Years

Chapter 2

In the Wake of the Armstrong Investigation

A Royal Commission Investigates Life Insurance Operations in Canada

A Period of Growth and Visibility for the NALU Under Strong Leadership

The NALU Plays a Leading Role in Insurance Education

The NALU During World War I

Chapter 3

The Post-War Decade

The NALU's Extension of Activity

The Agents Move for Recognition

Chapter 4

The Depression and Aftermath

Annual Conventions and Midyear Meetings

The NALU Celebrates Its 50th Anniversary

Chapter 5

The Agents Earn Their Wings

World War II

The NALU Joins the Industry in Legislative Battles

The NALU Establishes the National Quality Award

Chapter 6

Controversies and Schisms (1946-1956)

The Foundation of LUTC

The Nola Patterson Affair

GAMC Formally Organized

Chapter 7

The NALU Goes to Washington

Dispute Over Minimum Deposit Insurance Plans

GAMC Stages First LAMP Meeting

The NALU Celebrates Its Diamond Jubilee Year

The NALU Increases Political Activity

U.S. Senate Antitrust and Monopoly Subcommittee Investigate Life Insurance

The NALU Responds to Consumerist Activism

Chapter 8

The NALU Reaches the Century Mark

FTC Releases a Study Critical of the Insurance Industry

Formation of the Women Life Underwriters Conference

Drop in Local Membership

The NALU Issues Statements on AIDS

The NALU Combats a New Wave of Attacks

The NALU Celebrates a Century of Service

Open Book

Book Marks

[i] Dowling, Op. Cit., pp. 101-102
[ii] Ibid., p. 31
[iii] LAN, December 1958, p. 20
[iv] Woodson: Interview, July 1985
[v] The Washington Post, July6, 1956
[vi] NALU: committee Repors of the National Assocition of Life Underwrites Annual Convention, September 1957, p.8
[vii] LAN, March 1959, p. 120.
[viii] LAN, July 1959, p.51
[ix] LAN March 1958 p.5

Top     LEGAL NOTICES     Contact Webmaster    Netscape 7 Download

Change/Renew NAIFA Membership     Get Advisor Today: Join NAIFA

© Advisor Today 2003. All Rights Reserved.