The 1936 Classic by Dale Carnegie Changed the Life of Donna Reed

Donna Reed's daughter, Mary Owen, reflects on how the gift of a classic business book influenced the life of her mother.

Long before Hollywood knew her name, Donna Reed was a teenager growing up on a small farm in Iowa. The values she learned from family life—and a copy of Dale Carnegie's soon-to-become-classic business book How to Win Friends and Influence People—would leave a lasting impression on the woman she would become.

The book was given to Donna by a high school teacher who recognized that Donnabelle Mullenger already possessed qualities that would later define her future. She had a deep understanding of hard work, a sense of community, and a genuine appreciation for the value of people from all walks of life.

Teaching biology and chemistry at Denison High School in 1936, Ed Tompkins later recalled: "I saw in Donna a bright and intelligent girl, and sensed that underneath her shyness there was a natural charm."

Tompkins believed he recognized a certain shyness in Donna that others in the small town may not have fully understood. Like Donna, he had grown up on a farm. His family's farm was outside Winterset, Iowa, and he remembered feeling awkward and out of place as a high school student. He recalled wearing chore overalls to school when many of the town children did not. He knew firsthand that farm children sometimes carried a certain stigma in small-town communities.

Tompkins recognized the possibility of those same feelings in Donna and believed that Dale Carnegie's book might offer an important perspective to the young farm girl.

As Mary Owen explains, "My mother was naturally interested in people. She was kind, curious, and genuinely enjoyed connecting with others. The Dale Carnegie book didn't make her into that person. It helped show her that those qualities mattered and that they could take her anywhere."

In Carnegie's bestselling book, Donna encountered the promise that success was not reserved for people with wealth, influence, or big-city connections. Character mattered. Listening mattered. Relationships mattered.

In many ways, the book leveled the playing field and illuminated a clear path that might otherwise have seemed mysterious.

"It gave her confidence that being herself was enough," Mary says. "The qualities she had learned from her close-knit farming family were valuable, and she already possessed them."

In many ways, the book simply put into words something Donna already seemed to understand. The values she had learned from her family and farm life, along with the qualities that were distinctly her own, were not small-town limitations. They were real strengths that could help her navigate and succeed in a much larger world.

The book remained meaningful to Donna Reed, just as it has for millions of other readers. Hollywood was a very different world from Crawford County. But many of the qualities that helped her succeed as a film star and a pioneer in television were the same qualities she had learned on the farm.

A thoughtful teacher recognized the potential in a shy farm girl and placed a book into her hands. Decades later, it remains a fascinating part of Donna Reed's story—not because the book changed who she was, but because it affirmed that people can follow their dreams while still holding tightly to integrity, courtesy, equity, and humanity.

Since its publication in 1936, How to Win Friends and Influence People has sold more than 30 million copies, making it one of the best-selling business books of all time.

Published in November 1936, it sold 70,000 copies in just three weeks. By November 1939, sales had reached one million copies.

When Dale Carnegie's book first appeared in print, Donna Reed was a 15-year-old high school student living near Denison, Iowa. The book remained important to her across her life. About two years later, in September 1938, she moved to California to attend Los Angeles City College. By 1948, she had appeared in more than 20 films including It's A Wonderful Life.

An Oscar® and Golden Globe® winner, Donna Reed made 40+ movies. An acclained industry pioneer, Donna earned her star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame—one of the first women in film to own a television production company, star in her own Emmy-nominated, hit TV series, and grace the cover of TV Guide six times.

The Library of Congress honors two Donna Reed movies on the National Film Registry. The American Film Institute hails the five-time-Academy-Award®-nominated Frank Capra film, It’s A Wonderful Life, as one of the Top 100 Greatest American Films 

of All Time.

The world remembers her as someone who believed that it is possible to follow your dreams with integrity, equity, courtesy, and humanity...and then she did.