The Lasting Legacy Of Adman Jim Johnson

A file photo of Jim Johnson

If what matters in the end is the memories you create, Jim Johnson, the advertising artist who put the J in Little Rock advertising firm CJRW, left this world a far richer place.

Colleagues, contemporaries and admirers gathered after his death in November at age 89, recalling a one-in-a-million mixture of artistic talent, quick wit, ad instincts and varied passions, from running to rock ’n’ roll.

CJRW said that Arkansas’ modern advertising age owes its existence to Johnson and other industry trailblazers of his era. Johnson, who founded the firm with writer Wayne Cranford in 1961, quickly began inspiring camaraderie and fun at work.

“His unique sense of humor and keen insight into how to best connect with consumers made him one of the most sought-after creative minds in the business,” CEO Darin Gray said in a statement on behalf of the firm. “He served as a role model for the generations of art directors and creative managers that came after him. Jim was truly a giant in our business.”

Johnson mentored and dazzled new generations in Arkansas advertising until his retirement in 2000.

Chip Culpepper, partner and chief artistic director of mhp.si in Little Rock, gave a one-word description:  “Genius, with a capital ‘G.’”

“He has remained a huge influence on how I approach my craft … every day, and how I try to treat everyone in the workplace.”

Johnson’s pictures spoke millions of words, with wit, insight and humanity, associates said.

Sells Agency owner Mike Sells called Johnson a coach of collaboration.

“He was kind to everyone,” said Sells, who served two tours with Johnson, the second after the firm merged with the Woods Brothers Agency in 1990.

“Jim was the perfect and much-needed balance to other aspects of the office culture — calm in the midst of chaos, light-hearted and fun when things would get heavy, and appropriately mischievous when things would get too serious,” Sells said.

Sells recalled finishing his first half-marathon when he was relatively new at Cranford Johnson Robinson Associates.

“The following week, Jim had drawn an awesome cartoon of me crossing the finish line that my wife framed with my race number and a photo that I still have to this day,” Sells said.

When Johnson discovered that Culpepper shared his hometown, Hot Springs, he flashed his impish grin and said, “Is that statue of me up yet?”

Johnson’s drawings rendered Culpepper as a pencil-necked 12-year-old in glasses, “Young Culpepper.”

“He intuitively knew that’s how I saw myself in the professional world,” Culpepper said. “I hated the way he drew me, but I treasure those cartoons.”

Longtime partner Shelby Woods, in a skillful obituary by Bill Bowden in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette that focused on Johnson’s life of music and running, called him “one of those iconic men in the communication business that sort of set the standard for many of the rest of us to live up to.”

Johnson started in the late 1950s at the Thomas C. Hockersmith Agency in Little Rock after briefly helping Hallmark reinvent the greeting card industry by injecting humor into the traditional schmaltz.

At Hockersmith, Johnson fell in with Cranford, and the rest is history.

A University of Arkansas graduate, Johnson said in a 2017 interview that neither he nor Cranford had a college advertising class on their resumes. “Wayne was a word man and I was a picture man, but we had no idea if we’d be able to make it,” Johnson continued. “Our first account was the Irma Dumas Dress Shop in North Little Rock.”

By the 1970s, the business was thriving and Johnson was working on his most famous creation, the “Arkansas” logo that has appeared for a generation on license plates and all manner of promotional items.

Culpepper recalled his last meeting with Johnson. “He and the late Wayne Cranford dropped by my office with our agency founder Steve Mangan, ” Culpepper said.

“It was a great visit and a wonderful surprise. As they left, Jim pulled me aside and quietly told me, ‘I’m really proud of you and what you’ve built, Young Culpepper.’ Those are the last words he said to me. I’ll remember them forever.”