When editors were gods

On this day...

... in 1967, Henry Luce, co-founder of Time magazine and longtime poo-bah of the Time-Life publishing empire, died in Phoenix at age 68.

On this day...

... in 1691, Edward Cave, the English printer generally credited with publishing the first modern magazine, was born. The Gentleman's Magazine began publication in 1731, a decade before the first magazine in the American Colonies.

Also on this day, in 1939, Fortune magazine published a survey-based article that concluded, "it appears practically impossible for [President Franklin D.] Roosevelt to be re-elected in 1940." Roosevelt ultimately defeated his Republican opponent, Wendell Willkie, with 54.7 percent of the popular vote and 449 electoral votes to Willkie's 82.

One giant leap day for Bunnykind

It was on a leap day 50 years ago, Feb. 29, 1960, that Playboy opened its first Playboy Club to the public, in the magazine's home city of Chicago. According to a recent press release commemorating the event, "Each club featured cocktail Bunnies, a camera Bunny, a checkroom Bunny, a cabaret Bunny, a gift shop Bunny, a bumper pool Bunny, a customer service Bunny, and floor Bunnies."  

On this day...

... in 2005, Henry Grunwald, longtime managing editor of Time magazine and editor-in-chief of Time Inc., died at age 82. His autobiography is "One Man's America" (Doubleday, 1997).

Quote

"Take only the best—only the best." — Arthur Grissom, editor of The Smart Set magazine, speaking to his eventual successor, Charles Hanson Towne, on this deathbed. In his 1926 memoir  "Adventures in Editing," Towne recalled that Grissom delivered the advice just "as he sank into unconsciousness."  

On this day...

... in 1948, Will Irwin, a journalist billed as, among other things, "the world's greatest reporter," died at age 74. Irwin served as an editor for Collier's Weekly, McClure's, and other major magazines of his day. 

Also on this day, in 1990, Malcolm Forbes, flamboyant publisher and nominal editor in chief of Forbes magazine, died at age 70. 

Quote

"No passion in the world is equal to the passion to alter someone else's draft." — attributed to H.G. Wells, among others

On this day...

... in 1901, Rounsevelle Wildman, former editor of the Overland Monthly, died in the sinking of the steamship City of Rio de Janeiro off San Francisco. Wildman had more recently served as the U.S. counsel general to Hong Kong. Wildman's wife and two children were also reported as among the 122 victims of the disaster, which occurred when the ship hit a rock in dense fog. 

George Washington on magazines

George Washington, whose birth in 1732 we celebrate on February 22, reportedly said this about magazines in a 1788 letter:

"I consider such easy vehicles of knowledge more happily calculated than any other to preserve the liberty, stimulate the industry, and meliorate the morals of an enlightened free people." 

On this day...

... in 1925, the first issue of The New Yorker appeared.

Quote

"Those carried away by power are soon carried away." — Malcolm Forbes, late editor-in-chief of Forbes magazine.

On this day...

... in 1898, Edward Weeks, longtime editor of The Atlantic Monthly, was born in Elizabeth, N.J. He died in 1989.