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ADDRESS BY
HONORABLE FARRIS BRYANT
DIRECTOR
OFFICE OF EMERGENCY PLANNING
BEFORE THE
NATIONAL ASSOCIATION
OF TRAVEL ORGANIZATIONS
WASHINGTON, D.C.
OCTOBER 11, 1966
-9
of the leisure time given us today.?" "Are we getting to know one another better, to understand each other more so than in the past?" Are we, in short, pursuing policies and cultivating attitudes which will promote unity in our Nation?"
These are very important questions today. Every time we visit a new area we learn a little more, and perhaps, understand a lot more about our fellow Americans. That is a by-product of travel which does not show up as dollar dividends, but it is a dividend this Nation must seek and find increasingly through every endeavor, including increased travel by its citizens.
-10
Running parallel to the domestic requirement for increased travel which every state feels and every state wants is the national objective of balanceof-payments. There is no ceiling on "import" of dollars into the United States through increased travel to our shores. Perhaps we could narrow the deficit by imposing restraints on our own travel abroad. But is that really the best answer? Surely, we would do better to bring more Europeans here. They bring with them more than dollars, than the money they spend. A good many of the businesses which grew up in Florida after World War i were started by soldiers, sailors and marines
-11
stationed in Florida. They liked what they saw and they stayed to build their lives and businesses there. By the same token, Europeans will see more than tourist attractions. They will see new products, new merchandising techniques, new materials for their own markets and they will return home with these innovations. In effect, the tourist from abroad is exposed to one huge Trade Fair called the United States. It is the biggest and most impressive exhibition in the world and it will sell goods. So we multiply many times over the dollars they will spend for their trip.
And just as domestic travel by our own citizens yields important benefits
-13
I submit there are five vehicles of cooperation which we should be encouraging.
1. We should seek more interstate, regional compacts in the travel field, as we have sought successfully in other fields. The Appalachia compact is already underway. It combines the skills and resources of the Federal Government and the States, with the States retaining the veto power over any programs conceived under it.
2. The second vehicle, along the same lines, involves States undertaking such compacts among themselves, although Federal technical competence would always be available. This might be called
-13
I submit there are five vehicles of cooperation which we should be encouraging.
1. We should seek more interstate, regional compacts in the travel field, as we have sought successfully in other fields. The Appalachia compact is already underway. It combines the skills and resources of the Federal Government and the States, with the States retaining the veto power over any programs conceived under it.
2. The second vehicle, along the same lines, involves States undertake ing such compacts among themselves, although Federal technical competence would always be available. This might be called
-15
3. It is in the interest of every State, their Congressman and Senators, to support the U.S. Travel Service. When we speak of support we should not confine it to the floor of Congress or to the appropriation it needs to do its job. Are the States taking full advantage of the Travel Service? Are they furnishing adequate and attractive poster and brochure material for distribution through the Travel Service abroad? Have the States really availed themselves of the full benefits of exper ience, their offices abroad, their channels to foreign media?
4. The fourth vehicle for
promoting the travel programs of the States involves exploitation of already
-16
available Federal activities. There are at least a dozen Federal agencies and departments whose activities can advance tourism throughout America. Let me give you some examples.
The Small Business Administration makes loans for industrial development; it also makes loans for recreational enterprises.
The Appalachian Regional Development Commission intends to construct more than 2300 miles of major arterial roads throughout an eleven-State area. Those new highways will open up new recreation areas wherever they reach.
The Department of the Interior is spending 76 million dollars for land and water conservation, the first
-17
requisite of a good recreational site. It assists Indian tribes to build tourist attractions on tribal lands. It provides fisheries management assistance; it returns Federal excise taxes on sporting arms to the States.
The Department of Agriculture's Farm Home Administration will make loans to farmers; it will also make loans for camping grounds, swimming facilities, tennis courts, vacation cottages and many other recreational attractions.
The point I make is this: There are a wide range of activities, not primarily instituted for assistance in promoting travel, which can be called
-18
upon for help. The President's Cabinet Task Force on Travel is ready to help the individual States find the Federal activities which can be most useful to your own promotional plans, so that your State can make the most of its unique attractions and character.
Every State, of course, ought to identify and develop its tourist attractions. Have we, with vision and foresight, transformed our trackless wilderness, with poor roads or none at all, with almost deserted lakes and streams, into a mecca for weary Americans seeking the solitude of such a spot? The Federal Government cannot provide this ingenuity and imagination as well as the officials of the State and those
-it
who know every lake, mountain and stream in it. It must stem from the States themselves. They must, in fact, devote as much energy to promoting tour ism as they do to promoting other industries.
The fifth vehicle I would suggest
does not fall in the category of glamorous promotional programs. It doesn't even involve the expenditure of more money. it is, however, exceedingly important. The individual American must want fellow Americans and foreigners to visit his community and his State. He must open his heart to the traveler.
It is not enough to say, "This is a beautiful country; spend your vacation here." Hospitality -- and the small gestures which are the hallmarks of
This is a delightful occasion for
me. My association with this organization has been so pleasant, and your membership was so good to Florida while I served as its Governor that to greet you now is to meet again an old friend.
Please forgive me if I seem to suffer from a lapse of memory and tell you again how wonderful it is to have you in Florida. Believe me, I mean only to express my pleasure, not start an argument.
Not too many months ago there broke out in the public press a controversy over some new maps. They gave credence to the theory that Leif Ericson had chanced upon America before Christopher Columbus came to our shores. And just
-20
hospitality -- must be practiced every day. Tourists are not going to be attracted, or at least they will not return to or tell their friends and families about, a spot where the taxi driver was gruff and indifferent; where the desk clerk at the hotel looked down upon their different clothes or a wide-brimmed Western hat. They are not going to remember fondly an area whose people thought of tourists as a group to be tolerated.. .not welcomed. They are not going to carry pleasant thoughts back from a vacation marred by speed traps and other local ordinances which exploit the unknowing visitor. These things are taken for granted, but they are as important as the most
-21
professional and novel promotional techniques.
There is a very minor rhyme, author unknown, that goes like this:
A little bit of quality
Will always make them smile
A little bit of courtesy
Will bring them in a mile
A little bit of friendliness Will gladden them, 'tis plain
And a little bit of service Will bring them back again.
As qualities of welcome and
hospitality are brought forth by all the people of the fifty States, tourists will follow. They will come back again and tell their friends about pleasant exper iences.
-22
I would like to pledge to you
4wg-h-t the wholehearted support of the President's Cabinet Task Force on Travel in our mutual endeavor, and I assure you that the President in his management of the resources of the Nation and in liaison with the chief executives of the States will do his part to help make the beauty of America the national resource which is its proper role.
-22
I would like to pledge to you
tosigh-t the wholehearted support of the President's Cabinet Task Force on Travel in our mutual endeavor, and I assure you that the President in his management of the resources of the Nation and in liaison with the chief executives of the States will do his part to help make the beauty of Amer ica the national resource which is its proper role.
-2
last week another gentleman, a Welshman by the name of Prince Medoc, was reported to have reached Mobile, Alabama, some time in the 11th century.
I would not be so bold as to enter that controversy, but I was relieved that Ponce deLeon and his exploits in Florida in search of the fountain of youth had not been drawn into the debate. Florida remains a wonderful place to visit, and a grand place to live and retain one's youthful vigor with or without the waters from the fountain of youth.
But those venturesome explorers did accomplish what millions of Americans under much more comfortable
-3
circumstances have not yet done. They did see America!
What they came to find we take for granted.
It is incredible that Americans can fly across our magnificent land on their way to other countries without having stopped along the way to see the throbbing, varied and majestic land which is their own.
There is nothing wrong with ancient monuments, but how much more beautiful to those who first have seen the monuments nature has erected in our awesome mountain peaks.
There is nothing wrong with
romantic canals, but how much more we can appreciate their quiet beauty when
-4
one has first seen our mighty rivers, soaring bridges and skyline highways.
This is a big and inspiring country still to be seen and appreicated by millions of Americans. I think of the Chicago firm that sent a wire to its salesman in Texas saying that as long as he was in El Paso he might as well pay a visit to customers in Texarkana. The salesman wired back, "Take a look at your map and you'll find it's cheaper to send a man from Chicago. You're closer than I am."
The message I bring to you today is that we have a President who appreciates the bigness of our land, who marvels at the diversity of its people, who respects the differences
-5
of culture and climate and conviction which abound in this remarkable country.
And speaking of the President, his trips around the country are the best advertisement I know for travel in general It is at these times, when he can draw strength and new energy from the people and when he is exposed to the rich amalgam of our land, that the President is at his best. It is the best tonic I know for a man who works as hard and carries as many burdens as does President Johnson.
He is determined that more Americans will travel and that more Europeans will visit our country.
-6
I do not have to impress upon you the importance of tourism as a factor in world trade. It represents a gigantic $8 billion a year, the largest single item of international commerce.
What a vast, untapped resource for the American tourist business! If we seem to be on the short end of the international travel stick, it is largely because of two problems:
1. We have more freedom than the other people of the world, and Americans use their freedom to travel;
2. We have more prosperity than the other people of the world, and Americans use their prosperity for
travel.
-7
In this "vale of tears," those are nice problems. And the solutions will be equally pleasant. There are still millions of Americans who have never left home.
It is a fact that more than 80 million Americans each year take no vacation at all at a time when they are earning more money and enjoying more leisure time than ever before in our history.
It is a fact that 80 percent of our people have never traveled in an airplane at a time when that mode of travel is commonplace.
It is a fact that tourism, now a $30 billion industry and our third largest, has barely scratched the surface.
It is a problem... and a potential that interests me for three reasons. First, I come from a State where tourism is a major industry; second, I am a member of the Vttm President's lomme#+mee
- F K TrH v e t :-,T-tm-i; ad third, I serve as the President's liaison with the Governors for Federal-State relations.
The U.S. Travel industry, it seems to me, is at the center of the solution to two large problems confronting our Nation today. The first stems from affluence. Certainly we are earn ing more, enjoy more leisure time, than ever before in our history. Whether it is travel or any other activity we ask ourselves, "Are we making the best use
PAGE 1
ADDRESS BY HONORABLE FARRIS BRYANT DIRECTOR OFFICE OF EMERGENCY PLANNING BEFORE THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF TRAVEL ORGANIZATIONS WASHINGTON, D.C. OCTOBER 11, 1966
PAGE 2
-9of the leisure time given us today.?" "Are we getting to know one another better, to understand each other more so than in the past?" Are we, in short, pursuing policies and cultivating attitudes which will promote unity in our Nation?" These are very important questions today. Every time we visit a new area we learn a little more, and perhaps, understand a lot more about our fellow Americans. That is a by-product of travel which does not show up as dollar dividends, but it is a dividend this Nation must seek and find increasingly through every endeavor, including increased travel by its citizens.
PAGE 3
-10Running parallel to the domestic requirement for increased travel which every state feels and every state wants is the national objective of balanceof-payments. There is no ceiling on "import" of dollars into the United States through increased travel to our shores. Perhaps we could narrow the deficit by imposing restraints on our own travel abroad. But is that really the best answer? Surely, we would do better to bring more Europeans here. They bring with them more than dollars, than the money they spend. A good many of the businesses which grew up in Florida after World War i were started by soldiers, sailors and marines
PAGE 4
-11stationed in Florida. They liked what they saw and they stayed to build their lives and businesses there. By the same token, Europeans will see more than tourist attractions. They will see new products, new merchandising techniques, new materials for their own markets and they will return home with these innovations. In effect, the tourist from abroad is exposed to one huge Trade Fair called the United States. It is the biggest and most impressive exhibition in the world and it will sell goods. So we multiply many times over the dollars they will spend for their trip. And just as domestic travel by our own citizens yields important benefits
PAGE 5
-13I submit there are five vehicles of cooperation which we should be encouraging. 1. We should seek more interstate, regional compacts in the travel field, as we have sought successfully in other fields. The Appalachia compact is already underway. It combines the skills and resources of the Federal Government and the States, with the States retaining the veto power over any programs conceived under it. 2. The second vehicle, along the same lines, involves States undertaking such compacts among themselves, although Federal technical competence would always be available. This might be called
PAGE 6
-13I submit there are five vehicles of cooperation which we should be encouraging. 1. We should seek more interstate, regional compacts in the travel field, as we have sought successfully in other fields. The Appalachia compact is already underway. It combines the skills and resources of the Federal Government and the States, with the States retaining the veto power over any programs conceived under it. 2. The second vehicle, along the same lines, involves States undertake ing such compacts among themselves, although Federal technical competence would always be available. This might be called
PAGE 7
-153. It is in the interest of every State, their Congressman and Senators, to support the U.S. Travel Service. When we speak of support we should not confine it to the floor of Congress or to the appropriation it needs to do its job. Are the States taking full advantage of the Travel Service? Are they furnishing adequate and attractive poster and brochure material for distribution through the Travel Service abroad? Have the States really availed themselves of the full benefits of exper ience, their offices abroad, their channels to foreign media? 4. The fourth vehicle for promoting the travel programs of the States involves exploitation of already
PAGE 8
-16available Federal activities. There are at least a dozen Federal agencies and departments whose activities can advance tourism throughout America. Let me give you some examples. The Small Business Administration makes loans for industrial development; it also makes loans for recreational enterprises. The Appalachian Regional Development Commission intends to construct more than 2300 miles of major arterial roads throughout an eleven-State area. Those new highways will open up new recreation areas wherever they reach. The Department of the Interior is spending 76 million dollars for land and water conservation, the first
PAGE 9
-17requisite of a good recreational site. It assists Indian tribes to build tourist attractions on tribal lands. It provides fisheries management assistance; it returns Federal excise taxes on sporting arms to the States. The Department of Agriculture's Farm Home Administration will make loans to farmers; it will also make loans for camping grounds, swimming facilities, tennis courts, vacation cottages and many other recreational attractions. The point I make is this: There are a wide range of activities, not primarily instituted for assistance in promoting travel, which can be called
PAGE 10
-18upon for help. The President's Cabinet Task Force on Travel is ready to help the individual States find the Federal activities which can be most useful to your own promotional plans, so that your State can make the most of its unique attractions and character. Every State, of course, ought to identify and develop its tourist attractions. Have we, with vision and foresight, transformed our trackless wilderness, with poor roads or none at all, with almost deserted lakes and streams, into a mecca for weary Americans seeking the solitude of such a spot? The Federal Government cannot provide this ingenuity and imagination as well as the officials of the State and those
PAGE 11
-itwho know every lake, mountain and stream in it. It must stem from the States themselves. They must, in fact, devote as much energy to promoting tour ism as they do to promoting other industries. The fifth vehicle I would suggest does not fall in the category of glamorous promotional programs. It doesn't even involve the expenditure of more money. it is, however, exceedingly important. The individual American must want fellow Americans and foreigners to visit his community and his State. He must open his heart to the traveler. It is not enough to say, "This is a beautiful country; spend your vacation here." Hospitality -and the small gestures which are the hallmarks of
PAGE 12
This is a delightful occasion for me. My association with this organization has been so pleasant, and your membership was so good to Florida while I served as its Governor that to greet you now is to meet again an old friend. Please forgive me if I seem to suffer from a lapse of memory and tell you again how wonderful it is to have you in Florida. Believe me, I mean only to express my pleasure, not start an argument. Not too many months ago there broke out in the public press a controversy over some new maps. They gave credence to the theory that Leif Ericson had chanced upon America before Christopher Columbus came to our shores. And just
PAGE 13
-20hospitality -must be practiced every day. Tourists are not going to be attracted, or at least they will not return to or tell their friends and families about, a spot where the taxi driver was gruff and indifferent; where the desk clerk at the hotel looked down upon their different clothes or a wide-brimmed Western hat. They are not going to remember fondly an area whose people thought of tourists as a group to be tolerated.. .not welcomed. They are not going to carry pleasant thoughts back from a vacation marred by speed traps and other local ordinances which exploit the unknowing visitor. These things are taken for granted, but they are as important as the most
PAGE 14
-21professional and novel promotional techniques. There is a very minor rhyme, author unknown, that goes like this: A little bit of quality Will always make them smile A little bit of courtesy Will bring them in a mile A little bit of friendliness Will gladden them, 'tis plain And a little bit of service Will bring them back again. As qualities of welcome and hospitality are brought forth by all the people of the fifty States, tourists will follow. They will come back again and tell their friends about pleasant exper iences.
PAGE 15
-22I would like to pledge to you 4wg-h-t the wholehearted support of the President's Cabinet Task Force on Travel in our mutual endeavor, and I assure you that the President in his management of the resources of the Nation and in liaison with the chief executives of the States will do his part to help make the beauty of America the national resource which is its proper role.
PAGE 16
-22I would like to pledge to you tosigh-t the wholehearted support of the President's Cabinet Task Force on Travel in our mutual endeavor, and I assure you that the President in his management of the resources of the Nation and in liaison with the chief executives of the States will do his part to help make the beauty of Amer ica the national resource which is its proper role.
PAGE 17
-2last week another gentleman, a Welshman by the name of Prince Medoc, was reported to have reached Mobile, Alabama, some time in the 11th century. I would not be so bold as to enter that controversy, but I was relieved that Ponce deLeon and his exploits in Florida in search of the fountain of youth had not been drawn into the debate. Florida remains a wonderful place to visit, and a grand place to live and retain one's youthful vigor with or without the waters from the fountain of youth. But those venturesome explorers did accomplish what millions of Americans under much more comfortable
PAGE 18
-3circumstances have not yet done. They did see America! What they came to find we take for granted. It is incredible that Americans can fly across our magnificent land on their way to other countries without having stopped along the way to see the throbbing, varied and majestic land which is their own. There is nothing wrong with ancient monuments, but how much more beautiful to those who first have seen the monuments nature has erected in our awesome mountain peaks. There is nothing wrong with romantic canals, but how much more we can appreciate their quiet beauty when
PAGE 19
-4one has first seen our mighty rivers, soaring bridges and skyline highways. This is a big and inspiring country still to be seen and appreicated by millions of Americans. I think of the Chicago firm that sent a wire to its salesman in Texas saying that as long as he was in El Paso he might as well pay a visit to customers in Texarkana. The salesman wired back, "Take a look at your map and you'll find it's cheaper to send a man from Chicago. You're closer than I am." The message I bring to you today is that we have a President who appreciates the bigness of our land, who marvels at the diversity of its people, who respects the differences
PAGE 20
-5of culture and climate and conviction which abound in this remarkable country. And speaking of the President, his trips around the country are the best advertisement I know for travel in general It is at these times, when he can draw strength and new energy from the people and when he is exposed to the rich amalgam of our land, that the President is at his best. It is the best tonic I know for a man who works as hard and carries as many burdens as does President Johnson. He is determined that more Americans will travel and that more Europeans will visit our country.
PAGE 21
-6I do not have to impress upon you the importance of tourism as a factor in world trade. It represents a gigantic $8 billion a year, the largest single item of international commerce. What a vast, untapped resource for the American tourist business! If we seem to be on the short end of the international travel stick, it is largely because of two problems: 1. We have more freedom than the other people of the world, and Americans use their freedom to travel; 2. We have more prosperity than the other people of the world, and Americans use their prosperity for travel.
PAGE 22
-7In this "vale of tears," those are nice problems. And the solutions will be equally pleasant. There are still millions of Americans who have never left home. It is a fact that more than 80 million Americans each year take no vacation at all at a time when they are earning more money and enjoying more leisure time than ever before in our history. It is a fact that 80 percent of our people have never traveled in an airplane at a time when that mode of travel is commonplace. It is a fact that tourism, now a $30 billion industry and our third largest, has barely scratched the surface.
PAGE 23
It is a problem... and a potential that interests me for three reasons. First, I come from a State where tourism is a major industry; second, I am a member of the Vttm President's lomme#+mee -F K TrH v e t :-,T-tm-i; ad third, I serve as the President's liaison with the Governors for Federal-State relations. The U.S. Travel industry, it seems to me, is at the center of the solution to two large problems confronting our Nation today. The first stems from affluence. Certainly we are earn ing more, enjoy more leisure time, than ever before in our history. Whether it is travel or any other activity we ask ourselves, "Are we making the best use
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