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Fall 1997 Volume II Issue 4 |
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Fall 1997 Volume II Issue 4 |
For some time now, the word has been out around Boston that ad honcho Gary Greenberg - 41, married with children - is involved with a sailor. And, rumor has it, there are pictures to prove it. Sounds like a hot one for the National Enquirer's tipline, but save your dime. There's no scandal. You see, Greenberg, co-chairman and co-creative director of the go-go Back Bay ad agency Greenberg Seronick O'Leary & Partners, would for as many people as possible to know about his association with one particular sailor, since he just happens to be America's number one private collector of Popeye memorabilia.Greenberg's fascination with the gnarly, pipe-tooting comic hero has roots that go back to his early childhood on Boston's North Shore. In particular, he recalls as a turning point his sixth birthday party where, surrounded by a gaggle of squealing school friends and a mountain of gaily wrapped gifts, he turned his gaze upward to observe the ceremony with which the cake was being ushered in. Placed before him, with candles aglow, was a lovingly crafted, multicolored confection whose significance went far beyond that of merely commemorating the years. To the starry-eyed party host it represented, quite literally, the shape of things to come the somewhat peculiar shape of that constantly rapping, spinach-quaffing mumbling-under-his-breath sailor, Popeye.
