I'm hard-nosed about luck...If you're persistent in trying and doing and working, you almost always make your own fortune. Jerry Della Femina More Quotes by Jerry Della Femina More Quotes From Jerry Della Femina On the weekends, some people garden; I slice salmon. Jerry Della Femina some-people some garden people Whether you're a mafia guy or in advertising, you always end up going back to your family. Jerry Della Femina end you advertising family I grew up in Brooklyn, N.Y., and I'm a great believer that you can't have too conservative a President nor too liberal a Supreme Court. So I'm a walking contradiction. I believe that you should try to really protect people's rights in every way, and also, people should be allowed to do what they do. Jerry Della Femina great you believe people Today's merger makers are not ad people; they're building communications companies. Jerry Della Femina merger building today people If the FBI is now in charge of bad taste, we're all doomed. Jerry Della Femina fbi bad now taste A lot of its readers are of an age where they forget to cancel. Jerry Della Femina cancel where age forget I came from a poor family in Coney Island. I learned to write by reading the 'Post.' This was my education. Jerry Della Femina family poor reading education I was the first advertising person who people could identify with. Jerry Della Femina person who advertising people I came into advertising in 1961. I had been turned down for jobs on the Ford account in the late Fifties as 'not their type.' If it hadn't been for Bill Bernbach, I would now be sitting in some luncheonette, continuing my life as a messenger. Jerry Della Femina my-life down sitting life Life was easy was back in the days before human resource departments controlled business and someone decided we all should be politically correct. Jerry Della Femina someone business easy life In the '50s and '60s, a family's first child went into the priesthood, the second went into the military, and the third child was an idiot and wound up in advertising. Jerry Della Femina child advertising idiot family Did I grow up thinking I'd ever be paged at the Beverly Hills Hotel? Did I ever think I'd make so much money writing ads? No. Jerry Della Femina grow think money thinking I don't want people ever to think I'm not in advertising. It's such a business of enthusiasm that if you're not totally excited about it, you should leave it. Jerry Della Femina think you business people I don't like to work for politicians because I hate to work on anything that you can't give back if it doesn't work. I sell products. I do a commercial for, say, Meow Mix, and you don't like it, you get your money back. You can return it. Politicians, you can't return. You're with them for four more years. And that's scary. Jerry Della Femina you money hate work Advertising is what I do. It's got me everything I have, and I'm not going to leave it. Jerry Della Femina leave everything me advertising I ran for political office in the Hamptons once in a war I was having with the village. I came in, there were four people running, and I came in around third. It was over my food market - they arrested me. I just wanted to go for office because I thought it would be an interesting to do. Jerry Della Femina me food war people