By the end of the day, ten students had signed contracts to work for Southwestern this summer.

"I'd like to do it because I could use the money and have no other summer job," a student who just signed with Southwestern said Tuesday.

The others also seemed more impressed by the money they could earn than by the opportunity to learn new skills.

But whether students will realize Calder's monetary promises is unclear. Allen W. Levy '73, who worked for Southwestern two years ago, said Tuesday that he thought the average income of a student salesman was between $1200 and $1400 each summer. He said he had done well, but that he had refused to sell it again because he had no faith in the product.

The Harvard salesmen Calder brought with him had a different point of view. They said they believe in what they are selling and that they each made between $2800 and $6000 last summer.

Calder said his company sells books to "middle class families, people who don't know much about books and whose children could benefit from them." He refused to call selling "manipulation," preferring the term "persuasion."

Describing his sales technique as "showing them the goods and seeing if they'll buy," he compared it "to asking a girl out on a date.