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There is no middle ground on how people feel about Billy Mays. You either hate him or love him. For some insane reasons, I admire the guy for his intestinal fortitude of standing and shouting his wares like an 1890s fruit salesman working his wagon through New York's Lower East Side. Don't get me wrong. I despise TV commercials as much as the next couch potato. They repeat the same ones too often and interrupt the reruns you're trying to watch. Many seem to be specially designed by evil ad agencies just to annoy the hell out of you.

Let's face it. That's what all TV pitchmen and women do. They incessantly peddle miracle cleaning powders, diet pills, miracle drugs and overpriced gas-guzzling SUVs. Some are very annoying, but if consumers were asked to vote for the champ of all TV pains in the butt, Billy Mays could win first prize. I don't care. I like the guy, because he's sincerely convinced that whatever product he is selling is the best damn product ever invented.

How many TV watchers grind their teeth down to the gums when Billy's bearded face appears on screen and starts yelling his pitch, It's "Hi. Billy Mays here for (________) Just fill in the name of OxiClean, OrangeGlo, Kaboom, Miracle Toenail Grower, Eliminate Spots From Your Dalmatian or some other hyped-up product.

Sometimes it's just a one-minute commercial on a major TV network site. On other occasions, Billy shows up on some obscure channel at 3 am, and delivers an hour-long session of a his loud, sing-song infomercial that makes you want to rush out and buy whatever he's selling, or form a posse and give Billy a necktie party. As I said, there's no middle ground.

William Mays, who just turned 50, grew up in the western Pennsylvania town of McKees Rocks. As a teenager he made his way to Atlantic City, the traditional town of shouting pitchmen. Before gambling came to town, that was the most popular free entertainment other than the the beach. I can remember as a fascinated youngster standing in my sand-encrusted bare feet near the open stands on the land side of the Boardwalk and enjoying the show.

It was fun listening to the competitive salesmen encouraging passing vacationers to stop and listen to pitches for various products, such as can openers, juicers and vegetable choppers. I remember an enthusiastic young guy named Ed McMahon, who seemed to have a voice twice as loud as all the others. Billy May learned his lessons well in competing with other shouters, and after summers ended, he parlayed his pitch skills and loud voice into appearances at fairs, trade shows and carnivals.

Destiny beckoned when, after a dozen hard years on the road, in 1993 Billy linked up with a rival pitchman named Max Appel. Max and Billy took their original cleaning products, including the famous OxiClean, into the newly-emerging schlock sales world of the Home Shopping Network. Billy's face and voice was ready to conquer America. As writers have said after such loud events as Chuck Yeager breaking the sound barrier, the ear-splitting music of the Grateful Dead and the Big Bang Theory, the rest is history.

Learn more about this author, Ted Sherman.
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