Decline and Fall: The Death Struggle of the Saturday Evening Post

Having read some of Friedrich's other books and liked them, and the fact that I have an interest in journalism, I picked up this used copy - it's OOP. Well, OF must have kept a daily journal, for there's almost a day by day account of the last few years of the Post. It gets a bit dry and repetitive, but hey, it's about what really happened there. Sort of amazing to see the struggle the editors had to convince a bunch of dudes in their 80's who comprised the board of directors to modernize the magazines (not just the Post). Combative and stodgy, they were living in the past. Starting in 1962, three incompetent presidents drove the magazine into the ground. Having worked at a couple of small companies with presidents who thought they were show more geniuses, but were instead lousy businessmen, I found it's interesting to see this happen with a large corporation that owned several magazines and printing facilities. show less

2515 Decline and Fall, by Otto Friedrich (read 6 Jul 1993) This book, written in 1969 and 1970, is about the author's time (from 1962 to 1969) with The Saturday Evening Post (when the magazine folded). When I was a boy we had a subscription to the Post from May 1939 till May 1941, and I read every non-fiction article in it, eventually, as well as the fiction serials. This book is actually quite good, though obviously not written for outsiders such as I am. It tells of Clay Blair and other people who were significant at the Post in its last five years. I found it a fascinating book--Friedrich is a good writer--even though the topic is certainly not 'current.' I rather like journalistic history.