A Powerful Message

Actually, maybe more. Except for diehard New England fans and aficionados of low-scoring, tactical football games, the Patriots’ 13-3 victory over the Los Angeles Rams was hardly a classic that will be the stuff of highlight clips for generations to come.

 

And the commercials? Do you even remember any of them a fortnight later? I certainly don’t, but there’s one from 2013 that I’ll never forget.

 

Late in Super Bowl XLVII, Dodge Ram pushed its product not with glitz, glitter, and special effects but with Paul Harvey’s moving “So God Made a Farmer” speech. It doesn’t get much better than that.

 

Harvey is quite familiar to those who populate an older demographic (with which, by the way, I can easily identify). A long-time radio commentator who passed away in 2009 at age 90, he had a clear voice, folksy manner, and unique linguistic style, punctuated often by well-timed pauses for effect. He was never shy about expressing his strong opinions on politics and current events, but he seemed at his best relating vignettes and parables about the hardworking everyman from Middle America.

 

Such was the case with that Dodge Ram commercial.

 

The two-minute narrative began with a panorama of rugged, bleak, snow-covered farmland and Harvey’s voice intoning, “And on the eighth…day, God looked down on his planned paradise…and said, ‘I need a caretaker.’”

 

In rapid succession, images scrolled across the screen, first of a rustic, wooden church, then of stoic, swarthy, salt-of-the-earth men and women with tired but enduringly strong and knowing countenances, going about their business without complaint or excuse, because that’s how they were raised, it’s their calling and livelihood, and it’s the right thing to do.

 

Harvey spoke of their dedication to the land, their love for their families, their heart and soul, their ingenuity, creativity, sensitivity, persistence, and precision, and their commitment to their community.

 

He concluded his message, first delivered in 1978 at a convention of the Future Farmers of America, with the image of a farmer replying only “…with smiling eyes, when his son says that he wants to spend his life doing…what…Dad…does.”

 

While the idea was to grab viewers’ attention and sell pickup trucks, Harvey’s poignant words were much more powerful than a sales pitch delivered during a football game.

 

They immediately made me think of my Dad, who grew up on a farm in rural Prince Edward County, VA, where he learned from his Dad – my Grandfather – the value of hard work and the attributes of loyalty, integrity, resilience, industriousness, perseverance, self-reliance, gratitude, a hoe-to-the-end-of-the-row mentality, and on and on: all the good stuff.

 

Throughout his life which spanned 101 years, he shared those attributes – not always in words but in actions and deeds – with his family and friends (including a host of business associates and competitors).

 

Harvey’s words, though, were more universal than that one, near-and-dear-to-my-heart example.

 

They harkened back to a simpler time, not one without challenges, but one that moved at a slower pace without the superfluity of stimuli that make today’s world so complicated, frenzied, and – let’s face it – scary.

 

They harkened also to a time without chaos (or, at least, less chaos than today) when there was some manner of decorum in the political arena, when people actually talked to one another rather than communicating through electronic shorthand, and when one’s word was solemn and sacred.

 

Did that world ever really exist? Probably not as I imagine. Alas, the passage of time has a way of skewing perception and creating illusions of sunny, breezy, carefree days.

 

The archetypal “characters” in Harvey’s narrative did not live easy lives, nor, I venture to say, do most people. One would presume, though, that they led fulfilling lives of mindful service, dedication, and quiet determination. Austere, unpretentious, and uncomplaining, they delivered a day’s work (or more) for a day’s pay. They were “stand-up” men and women. Though laconic, they spoke eloquently. And they cared for one another.

 

Quite a powerful message, don’t you think?

 -- Weldon Bradshaw