This Week (magazine)

McClelland Barclay cover for This Week (September 24, 1939)

This Week was a nationally syndicated Sunday magazine supplement that was included in American newspapers between 1935 and 1969. At its peak in 1963, This Week was distributed with the Sunday editions of 42 newspapers having a total circulation of 14.6 million.

When it went out of business in 1969 it was the oldest syndicated newspaper supplement in the United States.^[1] The newspapers it was distributed with include the Los Angeles Times, the Dallas News, The Plain Dealer (Cleveland, Ohio), and the Boston Herald. Magazine historian Phil Stephensen-Payne noted, "It grew from a circulation of four million in 1935 to nearly 12 million in 1957, far outstripping other fiction-carrying weeklies such as Collier's, Liberty and even The Saturday Evening Post (all of which eventually folded)."^[2]

Syndication

This Week was being published as the New York Herald Tribune Sunday Magazine^[3] when publisher Joseph P. Knapp changed its name and began to syndicate it to other newspapers.^[4] The first issue appeared on February 24, 1935.^[5] The magazine's editor at the time was Marie Mattingly "Missy" Meloney, who used the professional name Mrs. William Brown Meloney;^[6][7] she had been editing the Herald Tribune's Sunday magazine since 1926.^[8] In The New York Times, Henry Raymont wrote:

During the early years, This Week's editorial content was made up mainly of fiction articles by such major writers as Sax Rohmer, Erle Stanley Gardner, Pearl Buck, P.G.Wodehouse and Bruce Catton. It also published articles on national affairs by such major writers as former President Herbert H. Hoover, Adlai E. Stevenson, Richard M. Nixon and Nelson Rockefeller.^[1]

Peak

In 1942, This Week cut its size down and eliminated run-overs to back pages.^[3] It also changed to including 52 percent articles and 48 percent fiction; at one time it had contained 80 percent fiction.^[3]

William I. Nichols became editor of the magazine in June 1943, just before the death of Meloney the same month,^[9] and a year later the magazine started to turn a profit.^[7] In 1948, This Week surpassed the American Weekly as the top American newspaper supplement in terms of advertising revenue.^[7] Nichols turned the financial fortunes of This Week around by "shun[ning] anything controversial": "I'm neither pious nor preachy but my first principle is success and [decency] has paid off in success. You can bore a mass audience to death with acres of flesh. Why did burlesque die?"^[7]

By 1963, This Week reached its peak in circulation.^[1]

Demise

Later, This Week was owned by Publication Corporation, which was taken over by Crowell, Collier & Macmillan in a January 1968 merger, but the magazine was "already fighting for survival." William Woestendiek, former editor of IBM's Think magazine and former city editor of The Houston Post, was brought in to revamp the editorial format. "We tried hard to turn out a better editorial product," an unnamed Crowell, Coller executive told The New York Times. "We succeeded in doing it, but nobody wanted it."^[1]

The merged company "began to subsidize the magazine last May [1969] in the hope of restoring circulation, build advertising and make it a self-sustaining enterprise by Aug. 1." That effort was unsuccessful, and subscribing newspapers, with the then-total circulation of 9.9 million, were offered the opportunity to keep the supplement going by paying about $5 for each 1,000 copies. The attempt was fruitless, said Fred H. Stapleford, president and publisher of United Newspaper Corporation, and he announced that the last number would be issued on November 2, 1969.^[1] In a letter to the subscriber newspapers, he said:

I deeply regret having to advise you that the necessary circulation commitment cannot be attained. It is a pity that This Week, so long a distinguished member of the newspaper family, evidently has outlasted its economic usefulness to news papers and advertisers... we believe it would be foolhardy to continue publishing when all the vital signs are negative.^[1]

A memorandum to the 160 This Week employees pledged that "every effort would be made to find them jobs in other publications of Crowell, Collier, one of the nation's largest book publishing and educational business concerns."^[1]

Writers

Writers for This Week included:

• C.H. Garrigues
• Wilferd Arlan Peterson

References

1. ^ ^{a b c d e f g} Henry Raymont, "This Week Magazine Ends Publication Nov. 2," The New York Times, August 14, 1969, page 27.
2. ^ Stephensen-Payne, Phil. Galactic Central Publications.
3. ^ ^{a b c} "Press: Different This Week", Time, January 5, 1942.
4. ^ "Press: Knapp's Week", Time, February 24, 1935.
5. ^ William I. Nichols, quoted in "The Daily Mirror," Los Angeles Times, February 28, 2010.
6. ^ "Mrs. William Brown Meloney," editorial in The New York Times, June 25, 1943.
7. ^ ^{a b c d} "The Press: Sunday Puncher", Time, February 7, 1949.
8. ^ "The Press: Herald Tribune's Lady", Time, October 8, 1934.
9. ^ "The Press: This Week's Spirit," Time, June 14, 1943.