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Drawing on both business and cultural contexts, the author explores the development of an American phenomenon - professional advertising. She links advertising's rise and transformations to turn-of-the-century changes which affected American society, from the rise of professional specialization to the communications revolution made possible by new technologies. At the heart of the story, Laird finds a fundamental shift from the work of informing customers (telling people what manufacturers had to sell) to creating consumers (persuading people what they needed to buy). She also describes how and why the creators of advertisements laid claim to the notion of progress and used it to legitimate their powerful influence in American business and culture.