Helen Lawrenson (1907–1982)

Helen Brown was born in upstate New York. Her first work as a journalist was at the Syracuse Journal. She moved to Manhattan, where publisher Condé Nast became her lover and her boss at Vanity Fair (1932-1936), where she became managing editor. In 1939, she married Jack Lawrenson, a labor organizer and co-founder of the National Maritime Union. The New York Times said in her 1982 obituary: Helen Lawrenson's social observations in books and articles drew widely on her recollections of celebrities and her own adventures. She wrote extensively for Esquire and 45 years ago was the first woman to be a contributor to that magazine.