Below is an excerpt from an article that appeared in AdWeek upon Manley's death. The article was written by Judy Warner.
His friends say that Bob Manley would have hated this. A humble, self -effacing sort, Manley valued his privacy. he didn't seek the spotlight but throughout his more than 20 years as an art director, teacher and designer, it often found him. Manley and his copywriting partner, Dan Altman, formed Altman & Manley in Boston in 1981. It's peak came about five years later when it was billing around $30 million, and doing far out work for such clients as Fanny Farmer, Ben & Jerry's, FAO Schwarz and Placewares.
Colleagues remembered Manley, who died of cancer at this New Hampshire home last week, as being out of step with the times and out of sync with an industry that he never took all that seriously. Indeed Manley told ADWEEK during an interview in 1987, "When I first started in the business, it seemed to be confined by a lot of rules and limitations that were, for the most part, self-imposed. I decided that making it interesting would require constantly discovering new points of view."
A&M was a creatively driven shop, a reflection of Manley who always played by his own rules. he was an avid collector of antique children's toys and advertising memorabilia dating to the turn of the century. For inspiration, solace or points of view, he turned not to the writings of Jay Chiat or Bill Bernbach, but to antique books.
Manley eventually went on to establish a small independent design collaborative, which he ran out of his home in Goffstown, New Hampshire. When Manley learned that he had terminal cancer, he and his wife were in the process of building a home on Lake Winnipesaukee in Merideth New Hampshire. Construction was completed shortly before his death and Manley died at his new home in Meredith.