09 autumn reporter 1-20 - Franklin College

“When I go into a supermarket, I still get a kick out of seeing Doritos., ®
I think, ‘That was my idea, and it’s still going.’”
Along the way, he also met his future
wife, Charlotte. The couple had started a
family by the time Standard Brands
offered a product management position
at its Manhattan headquarters.
“I was the V8 ® juice product manager,”
said West. “It had been developed by a
company in Terre Haute (Ind.) and being
a Hoosier I already knew a little about it.”
West’s skillful management of the
V8 ® product line caught the attention
of headhunters who recruited him as a
sales manager for Comstock Foods,
an applesauce maker in upstate New York.
After that, West went to work for Lever
Brothers, makers of soaps and cosmetics.
Next, there was the advertising and
public relations agency of Young &
Rubicam, where he managed the JELL-O ®
account.
Soon after, a headhunter
representing
the Frito Co. called and
invited West to lunch with
the company president and the
chairman. The possibility of working
for an innovative snack company
sounded intriguing, but there was
one troublesome issue.
“Frankly, I had no idea then what a
Frito was,” recalled West.
However, it didn’t take long before
he hit the ground running as vice
president of marketing, sales and
advertising. He, Charlotte and their four
children moved from the East Coast to
Texas, where the Frito Co. had headquarters.
After a long career of managing
the Doritos ® brand, West retired from
Frito Co. as the executive vice president
Arch West ’36 and his wife, Charlotte, pose at the Well House during a visit to campus in the 1990s.
ARCHIVAL PHOTO
and a member of the board of directors,
but he didn’t stop working.
He took a reservist position with FEMA
and spent 10 years working on-call as a
coordinator of disaster recovery centers.
He and Charlotte traveled to cities
coping with crises and worked with
local government officials to help set up
communication centers, train volunteers,
educate victims about FEMA services and
distribute essential goods.
At almost 95, West says he enjoys “taking
it easy” these days. However, he still finds
time to exercise daily and enjoys reading
magazines and watching movies. Once in
awhile he reminisces about college, too.
“I still look back at Franklin for
rewarding me with the knowledge to
carry on after I graduated,” said West.
“I think I would have been lost at a big
school; Franklin was my style. The classes
were small, and even the professors who
didn’t have me in class knew my name.
I goofed off sometimes, but the
professors were fair; they looked out
for the students.”
According to West, some of the
neighbors in his retirement community
attended universities with enrollments of
30,000 or more students. He enjoys telling
them about his little alma mater in the
Midwest.
“I’m really proud of Franklin College.
I brag about it to my neighbors,” he said.
West served on the Franklin College
Board of Trustees from 1966 to 1975 and
attended his 60th class reunion over
Homecoming weekend in 1996.
WWW.FRANKLINCOLLEGE.EDU AUTUMN 2009 59