Reports: The New Yorker at 100
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Here is a roundup of articles celebrating the 100th Anniversary of The New Yorker’s publishing debut.
We at The Daily Cartoonist featured all the editorial drawings and cartoons from that first issue.
Others delved into the history of the magazine.
Origins
Literate in tone, far-reaching in scope, and witty to its bones, The New Yorker brought a new – and much-needed – sophistication to American journalism when it launched 100 years ago this month.
As I researched the history of U.S. journalism for my book “Covering America,” I became fascinated by the magazine’s origin story and the story of its founder, Harold Ross.
In a business full of characters, Ross fit right in. He never graduated from high school. With a gap-toothed smile and bristle-brush hair, he was frequently divorced and plagued by ulcers.
Ross devoted his adult life to one cause: The New Yorker magazine.
Christopher B. Daly for Conversation relates the fascinating origins of Harold Ross‘ magazine
The Conversation also presents Matther Ricketson’s thoughts as a regular New Yorker reader.
Like many, I entered The New Yorker through the cartoon door. The first cartoon I loved, and remember to this day, featured a New Yorker staple – two guys sitting in a bar – with one saying to the other: “I wish just once someone would say to me, ‘I read your latest ad, and I loved it’.”
For someone whose first job after university was an unhappy stint in an advertising agency, the cartoon was a tonic. They are still the first thing I look at when the magazine arrives by mail or the daily newsletter by email, and the first thing shared with my family. There have been around 80,000 published since the magazine’s first issue on February 25 1925.
Pablo Pardo at El Mundo America relates the history from that poker game to current editor David Remnick.
100 years, thousands of issues, countless stories
The New Yorker has evolved alongside a century of monumental change. From the roaring 20s to the age unfolding, it has been a steadfast investigator of history, covering wars, political upheavals, cultural shifts and social revolutions.
The magazine has published some of the most influential writers of the 20th and 21st centuries, including Truman Capote, Ernest Hemingway, Jamaica Kincaid, Fiona McFarlane and Hiromi Kawakami – offering a platform for literary giants and fresh voices alike.
It has also fostered the growth of renowned editors such as William Shawn, Robert Gottlieb and Tina Brown, all of whom helped shape it into an institution.
Still at Conversation Emily Baulch and Catharine Lumby examine the post-Ross issues.
The Covers
The first issue of The New Yorker published 100 years ago this week.
The cover featured the magazine’s mascot: a dandy, looking through a monocle at a butterfly.
The character and artwork was meant to be an “image of sophistication and making fun of itself at the same time,” Françoise Mouly, who has served as the magazine’s art editor for 32 years, told Morning Edition.
Obed Manuel and Milton Guevara at NPR talk to Françoise Mouly, art editor of The New Yorker.
Throughout it all, the first thing print readers see are the weekly magazine’s standout covers, some of which are meticulously hand-crafted, Mouly said.
“It looks different from all the other magazines because it was started in the era where magazine was a prime visual medium and the cover, as been for all of this time, a drawing done by an artist and signed by the artist,” Mouly said.
Elsewhere…
Excited Elon at the inauguration. Ohtani and Judge as titanic sluggers. The Mona Lisa refusing visitor photographs. And always, the palpable anxiety of a Roz Chast experience.
The New Yorker has defied media trends with conversation-starting covers that often go bold, go striking and go viral — even as many other national magazines have shuttered, and print covers have lost much of their cultural power.
Françoise Mouly, the art editor for roughly a third of the magazine’s existence, acknowledges that New Yorker covers are an anomaly. They’re the subject of the exhibition “Covering the New Yorker” at L’Alliance New York, part of the publication’s celebration of its centennial this month.
Mouly agreed to choose and comment on some of the most evocative covers from the New Yorker’s rich history
Michael Cavna and The Washington Post have The New Yorker art editor pick 10 outstanding covers. Or here.
The New Yorker Goes Against The Grain As A Successful Magazine
Magazines have been folding at an alarming rate. Support for once-revered titles like Newsweek or Time or for corporate parents like Condé Nast teeters ominously.
Despite layoffs, The New Yorker with its 1.23 million subscribers is itself a study in survival, as a forthcoming Netflix documentary will testify. The resilience of the magazine mirrors that of a Hollywood studio — a periodic “blockbuster” has fortified support.
Peter Bart at Deadline has The New Yorker being a highlight of the Condé Nast/Hearst magazine world.
Is there hope for rival magazines? While the folksy, friendly Readers’ Digest-style publications have faded, some thoughtful if politically argumentative ones still thrive – The Atlantic and The Economist, for example.
More about that Netflix documentary of The New Yorker for 2025 from Troy Pozirekides at Tudum.
In the meantime The New York Public Library has its own 15 minute mini-documentary.
Liza Donnelly and Michael Maslin and Jason Chatfield
I won’t go into a whole history here (even if I were capable!), but it has been such an influential publication in its lifetime, I wanted to honor the milestone birthday. Plus, it has been my professional “home” for 46 years, and I love the magazine.
New Yorker cartoonist Liza Donnelly writes an appreciation of The New Yorker.
New Yorker cartoonist Michael Maslin keeps us all up-to-date with the goings-on at The New Yorker.
For those keeping track, Harold Ross was editor for the 1925, 1935, and 1945 anniversary issues; William Shawn was editor for the 1955, 1975, and 1985 anniversary issues; Tina Brown oversaw the gilded issue of 1995; David Remnick has been editor for the 2005, 2015 ,and 2025 anniversary issues.
New Yorker cartoonist Jason Chatfield draws Eustace Tilley as he ages to 100.
Weirdness
The first issue of The New Yorker was dated February 21, 1925, one hundred years ago today. Unlike Weird Tales, The New Yorker has been published continuously since its inception. Also unlike Weird Tales, The New Yorker is a general interest magazine. It is and was a slick magazine, too, whereas Weird Tales was a pulp magazine for about as long as pulp magazines lasted. (Weird Tales switched to the digest format in 1953.) Even so, over the years, The New Yorker has published stories by authors of science fiction, fantasy, and horror.
Even Terence E. Hanley’s website, devoted to a popular pulp magazine, is joining in the celebration.
As always The New Yorker website abides.
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