Walter Lubars: “An Inspiration to a Generation of Advertising Students”
Walter Lubars, a COM professor emeritus, launched the college’s pioneering AdLab
Walter Lubars was tapped to serve as College of Communication interim dean in 1991. Photo by Fred Sway
“An Inspiration to a Generation of Advertising Students”
Walter Lubars, a COM professor emeritus, launched the college’s pioneering AdLab
Fifty years ago, the Ileitis and Colitis Foundation approached Walter Lubars to create a series of advertisements as a freelance assignment. The College of Communication professor saw the request as a way to help a good cause—and as an opportunity for four students eager for a new challenge.
Lubars turned the project into the first assignment for AdLab, the country’s first student-run advertising agency. Lubars, with colleague Bob Montgomery, a COM professor emeritus of advertising, founded the program in 1974. AdLab, now the largest student-run ad agency in the US, has helped make COM one of the top colleges for aspiring advertising executives, strategists, writers, and creatives.
And Lubars made a lasting mark on the college and the lives of his students and colleagues. He died October 4, 2024, at 93.
“Walter was the mensch of mensches,” says Tobe Berkovitz, a COM professor emeritus of advertising who worked closely with Lubars. “His sense of humor, his kindness, and his intelligence graced everyone who knew him. He was an inspiration to a generation of BU advertising students.”
Lubars was tapped to serve as interim dean of the college in 1991. To hear the announcement, COM faculty had gathered in Room 106, and “with a bit of drama,” Berkovitz says, University President John Silber announced the news to loud applause. “In his droll style, Walter says, ‘I’m not sure you are applauding because it is me, or because it isn’t you.’ That’s Walter for you,” Berkovitz says.
Margaret Wallace, a COM associate professor of the practice, media innovation, was an administrator when Lubars was a department chair. “He was one of the kindest and most genuine individuals I’ve had the privilege of knowing,” says Wallace (COM’89). “Walter had a fantastic sense of humor and was a gifted storyteller. I can fondly remember many hours spent in his company, listening to his compelling and often very funny stories.”
David Lubars (CGS’78, COM’80), one of Walter’s sons, said in a 2023 interview in the magazine COM/365 that he could see his father had started something special in AdLab.
“You learn pressure and deadlines and having to go back and do it all over again,” said David, who went on to become chief creative officer at BBDO Worldwide. “So, when you start at an agency, you already understand the frantic and sometimes chaotic nature of the business. It’s experience that is so valuable.”
Walter Lubars, born in New York City, attended the City College of New York and Rutgers University for his graduate studies. He served in the Army Signal Corps during the Korean War and later wrote for notable advertising and public relations agencies, including Burson-Marsteller and J. Walter Thompson.
He wrote novels, including The Monterey Marauders and Chasing the Wind, both in 2014, and instructional texts, such as Guidelines for Effective Writing: Qualities and Formats (Countryside Press, 1978).
Upon his retirement, the college established the Walter Lubars Prize in Advertising.
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