San Francisco advertising man and a major McLuhan contact through the 1960s. Bob draws his bottom-up chart from a Gossage line in Gerald Stearn's McLuhan: Hot and Cool (1967) — something moving from "the last word" through cliché and art form to archetype — and it was to Gossage that McLuhan sent his daughter Mary when she landed penniless in San Francisco.
Across the dialogues
The San Francisco contact — his cliché→archetype schema, and the home McLuhan sent Mary to
Gossage's schema — something passing from "the last word" through cliché and art form to archetype "through use" — is the spine of Bob's bottom-up chart.
"This is from a quote by Howard Gossage."
On Marshall's advice, Mary lived with the Gossages in San Francisco for about two years after arriving penniless.
"He said: go visit Howard Gossage. So she went there and she lived with the Gossages for a couple of years."
His shop traced forward into the anti-television polemic — Jerry Mander's Four Arguments read as bad McLuhan learned young from the ad man who made McLuhan famous
The genealogy is the point — the most influential attack on television came out of the operation that promoted McLuhan, and got him wrong from the inside.
"the guy who wrote that work for the ad man that made McLuhan famous. What's that guy's name? Gossage."
Connections
Bob's bottom-up chart draws on a Gossage line — last word → cliché → art form → archetype through use.
On Marshall's advice, Mary lived with the Gossages in San Francisco for about two years (c. 1965–66).