Information from the American Legion magazine December 2009 article written by Philip M. Callaghan.
************************************
LEGIONNAIRES: THE FIRST GENERATION
He Founded The New Yorker magazine in 1925.
A Legionnaire from the very beginning, Harold W. Ross attended the Paris Caucus in March 1919, serving on The American Legion's Committee on Constitution and the American Expeditionary Force Executive Committee.
While a soldier in France, Ross became the editor of the military newspaper, Stars and Stripes. He also met his future wife, Jane C. Grant, who had left her job with The New York Times to join the YMCA Entertainment Corps overseas. After the two journalists returned stateside, they got married.
His wife went back to her previous job, and Ross eventually became editor of The American Legion Weekly. The couple Iived on Grant's income and saved his Legion paychecks for the day when they might be able to start their own publication.
In those days, the Legion editor and his wife moved in highly literary circles. Their brownstone apartment on 47th Street became a gathering place for artists and celebrities, including George Gershwin, Edna St. Vincent Millay, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Irving Berlin, Dorothy Parker and Harpo Marx.
Ross and his wife finally got the financial backing they needed to start publishing their own magazine. While Ross had several ideas, including a "Marine Gazette," his wife wanted to produce a weekly aimed at the tastes of the New York urban crowd. Thus, The New Yorker magazine was born on Feb. 21, 1925.
By the early 1940s, the publication had about 200,000 subscribers and some of the highest advertising revenue in the country.
As an editor, Ross usually had many questions for his authors. While John Hersey worked to finish his 1946 article on the bombing of Hiroshima. he was pelted by hundreds of questions and comments about the landmark piece from Ross.
Like many editors, Ross often felt mistreated by those who held the purse strings. "Good God, I have leaned over backwards playing fair with this organization until my spine is like a horseshoe .... I've kept this publication going single-handed a lot of the time, saving it in crisis after crisis brought on by stupidity and neglect."
Ross had little good to say about two of his major competitors, Time and Life. He once wrote in a note to author E.B. White, "Life does a story on the placid and historic Thames and finds nude sunbathers on its banks. This must be the fifty-eighth way of working in naked women."
-Philip M Callaghan
THE DOSSIER
Born to parents George and Ida in Aspen, Colo., on Nov. 6, 1892.
By 25, Ross had worked for at least 10 newspapers, including the Atlanta Journal and Denver Post.
Enlisted in the Army in May 1917. Served with the 18th Engineers Railway Regiment.
Worked for Stars and Stripes in Paris from February 1918 to April 1919.
Discharged from military service at St. Aignan, France, on May 1, 1919.
Editor of The Home Sector, a weekly publication for veterans returning home from France, from September 1919 to April 1920.
Editor of The American Legion Weekly from 1920 to 1924.
Married Jane C. Grant, writer for The New York Times, in 1920.
Founding editor of The New Yorker magazine, 1925-1951.
Died from lung cancer Dec. 6, 1951, in Boston, age 59.
Read more about Harold Ross at www.wikapedia.com The Free Encyclopedia online.
***********************************
World War I photo from Wikapedia. Second photo from the American Legion magazine article (Corbis).
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The information is from the biography Genius in Disguise: Harold Ross of the New Yorker, by Thomas Kunkel (Random House, 1995). Kunkel writes (this is paraphrased slightly):
Before his final surgery, he gave last-minute instructions to his friend and colleague R. Hawley Truax (Chairman of the Board of the New Yorker). Ross specified a simple service, as well as his wish to be cremated. Ross died during the surgery. In 1956, in accord with his final wish, the remains of Harold Wallace Ross were dispersed over the emerald mountains of Aspen, Colorado.
By the way, I very much appreciated the sentiments you expressed on your contributor page! Thanks for sharing them with us.
Warm regards,
The above information provided by contributor Terry (Todd) Ferl, # 47880583, on June 4, 2017.
************************************
LEGIONNAIRES: THE FIRST GENERATION
He Founded The New Yorker magazine in 1925.
A Legionnaire from the very beginning, Harold W. Ross attended the Paris Caucus in March 1919, serving on The American Legion's Committee on Constitution and the American Expeditionary Force Executive Committee.
While a soldier in France, Ross became the editor of the military newspaper, Stars and Stripes. He also met his future wife, Jane C. Grant, who had left her job with The New York Times to join the YMCA Entertainment Corps overseas. After the two journalists returned stateside, they got married.
His wife went back to her previous job, and Ross eventually became editor of The American Legion Weekly. The couple Iived on Grant's income and saved his Legion paychecks for the day when they might be able to start their own publication.
In those days, the Legion editor and his wife moved in highly literary circles. Their brownstone apartment on 47th Street became a gathering place for artists and celebrities, including George Gershwin, Edna St. Vincent Millay, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Irving Berlin, Dorothy Parker and Harpo Marx.
Ross and his wife finally got the financial backing they needed to start publishing their own magazine. While Ross had several ideas, including a "Marine Gazette," his wife wanted to produce a weekly aimed at the tastes of the New York urban crowd. Thus, The New Yorker magazine was born on Feb. 21, 1925.
By the early 1940s, the publication had about 200,000 subscribers and some of the highest advertising revenue in the country.
As an editor, Ross usually had many questions for his authors. While John Hersey worked to finish his 1946 article on the bombing of Hiroshima. he was pelted by hundreds of questions and comments about the landmark piece from Ross.
Like many editors, Ross often felt mistreated by those who held the purse strings. "Good God, I have leaned over backwards playing fair with this organization until my spine is like a horseshoe .... I've kept this publication going single-handed a lot of the time, saving it in crisis after crisis brought on by stupidity and neglect."
Ross had little good to say about two of his major competitors, Time and Life. He once wrote in a note to author E.B. White, "Life does a story on the placid and historic Thames and finds nude sunbathers on its banks. This must be the fifty-eighth way of working in naked women."
-Philip M Callaghan
THE DOSSIER
Born to parents George and Ida in Aspen, Colo., on Nov. 6, 1892.
By 25, Ross had worked for at least 10 newspapers, including the Atlanta Journal and Denver Post.
Enlisted in the Army in May 1917. Served with the 18th Engineers Railway Regiment.
Worked for Stars and Stripes in Paris from February 1918 to April 1919.
Discharged from military service at St. Aignan, France, on May 1, 1919.
Editor of The Home Sector, a weekly publication for veterans returning home from France, from September 1919 to April 1920.
Editor of The American Legion Weekly from 1920 to 1924.
Married Jane C. Grant, writer for The New York Times, in 1920.
Founding editor of The New Yorker magazine, 1925-1951.
Died from lung cancer Dec. 6, 1951, in Boston, age 59.
Read more about Harold Ross at www.wikapedia.com The Free Encyclopedia online.
***********************************
World War I photo from Wikapedia. Second photo from the American Legion magazine article (Corbis).
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The information is from the biography Genius in Disguise: Harold Ross of the New Yorker, by Thomas Kunkel (Random House, 1995). Kunkel writes (this is paraphrased slightly):
Before his final surgery, he gave last-minute instructions to his friend and colleague R. Hawley Truax (Chairman of the Board of the New Yorker). Ross specified a simple service, as well as his wish to be cremated. Ross died during the surgery. In 1956, in accord with his final wish, the remains of Harold Wallace Ross were dispersed over the emerald mountains of Aspen, Colorado.
By the way, I very much appreciated the sentiments you expressed on your contributor page! Thanks for sharing them with us.
Warm regards,
The above information provided by contributor Terry (Todd) Ferl, # 47880583, on June 4, 2017.
Information from the American Legion magazine December 2009 article written by Philip M. Callaghan.
************************************
LEGIONNAIRES: THE FIRST GENERATION
He Founded The New Yorker magazine in 1925.
A Legionnaire from the very beginning, Harold W. Ross attended the Paris Caucus in March 1919, serving on The American Legion's Committee on Constitution and the American Expeditionary Force Executive Committee.
While a soldier in France, Ross became the editor of the military newspaper, Stars and Stripes. He also met his future wife, Jane C. Grant, who had left her job with The New York Times to join the YMCA Entertainment Corps overseas. After the two journalists returned stateside, they got married.
His wife went back to her previous job, and Ross eventually became editor of The American Legion Weekly. The couple Iived on Grant's income and saved his Legion paychecks for the day when they might be able to start their own publication.
In those days, the Legion editor and his wife moved in highly literary circles. Their brownstone apartment on 47th Street became a gathering place for artists and celebrities, including George Gershwin, Edna St. Vincent Millay, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Irving Berlin, Dorothy Parker and Harpo Marx.
Ross and his wife finally got the financial backing they needed to start publishing their own magazine. While Ross had several ideas, including a "Marine Gazette," his wife wanted to produce a weekly aimed at the tastes of the New York urban crowd. Thus, The New Yorker magazine was born on Feb. 21, 1925.
By the early 1940s, the publication had about 200,000 subscribers and some of the highest advertising revenue in the country.
As an editor, Ross usually had many questions for his authors. While John Hersey worked to finish his 1946 article on the bombing of Hiroshima. he was pelted by hundreds of questions and comments about the landmark piece from Ross.
Like many editors, Ross often felt mistreated by those who held the purse strings. "Good God, I have leaned over backwards playing fair with this organization until my spine is like a horseshoe .... I've kept this publication going single-handed a lot of the time, saving it in crisis after crisis brought on by stupidity and neglect."
Ross had little good to say about two of his major competitors, Time and Life. He once wrote in a note to author E.B. White, "Life does a story on the placid and historic Thames and finds nude sunbathers on its banks. This must be the fifty-eighth way of working in naked women."
-Philip M Callaghan
THE DOSSIER
Born to parents George and Ida in Aspen, Colo., on Nov. 6, 1892.
By 25, Ross had worked for at least 10 newspapers, including the Atlanta Journal and Denver Post.
Enlisted in the Army in May 1917. Served with the 18th Engineers Railway Regiment.
Worked for Stars and Stripes in Paris from February 1918 to April 1919.
Discharged from military service at St. Aignan, France, on May 1, 1919.
Editor of The Home Sector, a weekly publication for veterans returning home from France, from September 1919 to April 1920.
Editor of The American Legion Weekly from 1920 to 1924.
Married Jane C. Grant, writer for The New York Times, in 1920.
Founding editor of The New Yorker magazine, 1925-1951.
Died from lung cancer Dec. 6, 1951, in Boston, age 59.
Read more about Harold Ross at www.wikapedia.com The Free Encyclopedia online.
***********************************
World War I photo from Wikapedia. Second photo from the American Legion magazine article (Corbis).
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The information is from the biography Genius in Disguise: Harold Ross of the New Yorker, by Thomas Kunkel (Random House, 1995). Kunkel writes (this is paraphrased slightly):
Before his final surgery, he gave last-minute instructions to his friend and colleague R. Hawley Truax (Chairman of the Board of the New Yorker). Ross specified a simple service, as well as his wish to be cremated. Ross died during the surgery. In 1956, in accord with his final wish, the remains of Harold Wallace Ross were dispersed over the emerald mountains of Aspen, Colorado.
By the way, I very much appreciated the sentiments you expressed on your contributor page! Thanks for sharing them with us.
Warm regards,
The above information provided by contributor Terry (Todd) Ferl, # 47880583, on June 4, 2017.
************************************
LEGIONNAIRES: THE FIRST GENERATION
He Founded The New Yorker magazine in 1925.
A Legionnaire from the very beginning, Harold W. Ross attended the Paris Caucus in March 1919, serving on The American Legion's Committee on Constitution and the American Expeditionary Force Executive Committee.
While a soldier in France, Ross became the editor of the military newspaper, Stars and Stripes. He also met his future wife, Jane C. Grant, who had left her job with The New York Times to join the YMCA Entertainment Corps overseas. After the two journalists returned stateside, they got married.
His wife went back to her previous job, and Ross eventually became editor of The American Legion Weekly. The couple Iived on Grant's income and saved his Legion paychecks for the day when they might be able to start their own publication.
In those days, the Legion editor and his wife moved in highly literary circles. Their brownstone apartment on 47th Street became a gathering place for artists and celebrities, including George Gershwin, Edna St. Vincent Millay, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Irving Berlin, Dorothy Parker and Harpo Marx.
Ross and his wife finally got the financial backing they needed to start publishing their own magazine. While Ross had several ideas, including a "Marine Gazette," his wife wanted to produce a weekly aimed at the tastes of the New York urban crowd. Thus, The New Yorker magazine was born on Feb. 21, 1925.
By the early 1940s, the publication had about 200,000 subscribers and some of the highest advertising revenue in the country.
As an editor, Ross usually had many questions for his authors. While John Hersey worked to finish his 1946 article on the bombing of Hiroshima. he was pelted by hundreds of questions and comments about the landmark piece from Ross.
Like many editors, Ross often felt mistreated by those who held the purse strings. "Good God, I have leaned over backwards playing fair with this organization until my spine is like a horseshoe .... I've kept this publication going single-handed a lot of the time, saving it in crisis after crisis brought on by stupidity and neglect."
Ross had little good to say about two of his major competitors, Time and Life. He once wrote in a note to author E.B. White, "Life does a story on the placid and historic Thames and finds nude sunbathers on its banks. This must be the fifty-eighth way of working in naked women."
-Philip M Callaghan
THE DOSSIER
Born to parents George and Ida in Aspen, Colo., on Nov. 6, 1892.
By 25, Ross had worked for at least 10 newspapers, including the Atlanta Journal and Denver Post.
Enlisted in the Army in May 1917. Served with the 18th Engineers Railway Regiment.
Worked for Stars and Stripes in Paris from February 1918 to April 1919.
Discharged from military service at St. Aignan, France, on May 1, 1919.
Editor of The Home Sector, a weekly publication for veterans returning home from France, from September 1919 to April 1920.
Editor of The American Legion Weekly from 1920 to 1924.
Married Jane C. Grant, writer for The New York Times, in 1920.
Founding editor of The New Yorker magazine, 1925-1951.
Died from lung cancer Dec. 6, 1951, in Boston, age 59.
Read more about Harold Ross at www.wikapedia.com The Free Encyclopedia online.
***********************************
World War I photo from Wikapedia. Second photo from the American Legion magazine article (Corbis).
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The information is from the biography Genius in Disguise: Harold Ross of the New Yorker, by Thomas Kunkel (Random House, 1995). Kunkel writes (this is paraphrased slightly):
Before his final surgery, he gave last-minute instructions to his friend and colleague R. Hawley Truax (Chairman of the Board of the New Yorker). Ross specified a simple service, as well as his wish to be cremated. Ross died during the surgery. In 1956, in accord with his final wish, the remains of Harold Wallace Ross were dispersed over the emerald mountains of Aspen, Colorado.
By the way, I very much appreciated the sentiments you expressed on your contributor page! Thanks for sharing them with us.
Warm regards,
The above information provided by contributor Terry (Todd) Ferl, # 47880583, on June 4, 2017.
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