A BRIEF HISTORY OF PARADE

PARADE Magazine, the most widely read magazine in America with a circulation of 34 million, began as a small publication with a print run of only 125,000 copies, sold on newsstands for a nickel. Today, PARADE is carried by more than 370 of the nation’s finest Sunday newspapers and reaches 79 million Americans every week.

The first issue of PARADE, subtitled “The Weekly Picture Newspaper,” was published on May 31, 1941. It was packed with photographs left over from PM, an experimental New York newspaper produced by Chicago businessman Marshall Field III. Less than two months later, THE NASHVILLE TENNESSEAN began to distribute PARADE on Sundays, and a few weeks after that, THE WASHINGTON POST, now PARADE’s oldest continuous subscriber, added PARADE to its Sunday package. By the end of 1942, PARADE was carried by 16 newspapers.

In 1946, Marshall Field hired Arthur H. (Red) Motley as president and publisher of PARADE, a position he held for nearly 30 years. Motley, noted for his incomparable salesmanship, increased the circulation of PARADE from 2 million in 1946 to more than 19 million when he retired on January 1, 1978. He made famous his favorite expression: “Nothing happens until somebody sells something.” Entering rapidly growing regional markets not covered by the other two Sunday magazines of the day, AMERICAN WEEKLY and THIS WEEK, Motley was largely responsible for expanding the number of PARADE distributing newspapers from 18 in 1946 to 116 in 1977.

Editor Jess Gorkin joined forces with Motley on December 9, 1946 and developed the unique “on-the-news” approach, which contributed to the magazine’s success. Not only did PARADE stay on top of the news, but as in the case of Gorkin’s proposal for a Washington-Moscow Hotline, it very often created it.

Marshall Field III died in 1956, and two years later, Marshall Field IV sold PARADE to John Hay Whitney, former Ambassador to the Court of St. James in London, and the magazine became a subsidiary of Whitney Communications Corporation.

PARADE was acquired by Booth Newspapers, Inc. in 1973 and subsequently became a sub-sidiary of Advance Publications, Inc., when Advance acquired the Booth organization in November 1976.

In 1977, Gorkin hired Walter Anderson, an award-winning investigative reporter and exper-ienced newspaper editor, to eventually succeed him. Anderson became editor of PARADE in 1980 and continued the magazine's “newsworthy” tradition, evidenced by stories dealing with the first U.S. interview with Pope John Paul II, the first interview with Hillary Rodham Clinton, the first report on Nuclear Winter by the late Dr. Carl Sagan and Presidents Ronald Reagan’s and George Bush’s personal fitness programs. Anderson was also instrumental in creating a significant awareness of meaningful literacy programs through articles and personal participation in various forums.

In the spring of 1987, Anderson was invited by the government of the Soviet Union to tour Russia for two weeks as part of an historic journalistic exchange with Vitaly Korotich, editor of the Soviet magazine OGONYOK, who in turn visited the United States. Articles by the two editors detailing their impressions of each other’s countries appeared side by side in each magazine.

Over the years, Anderson added such noteworthy staff editors as Dr. Isadore Rosenfeld, PARADE’s health editor, Food Editor Sheila Lukins and Science Editor David Levy. Contributing editors he attracted to the magazine have included Pulitzer Prize-winners Norman Mailer, David Halberstam and Carl Sagan, plus Gail Sheehy, Dotson Rader, Bud Greenspan, Willie Morris, Peter Maas and Dick Schaap. Pulitzer Prize-winning staff members included Eddie Adams and Jack Anderson. Nobel Prize winner Elie Wiesel is a frequent contributor.

Some of PARADE’s most popular and eduring features are its weekly columns. The celebrity profile column, “In Step With...” by James Brady, began in January 1986. “Guide to Better Fitness” by Michael O’Shea, Ph.D., and “Ask Marilyn” was added later that year. “Ask Marilyn” is written by Marilyn vos Savant, who is listed in the “Guinness Book of World Records Hall of Fame” as the person with the world’s highest IQ.

Launched in January 1990, “Fresh Voices” gives the nation’s teenagers an opportunity to make their opinions heard. In 2000, PARADE added Dr. Rosenfeld’s “Second Opinion,” a column on the latest useful information from the world of medicine. At the same time, “Inside.com” made its debut in the magazine under the byline of Lamar Graham, who provided the latest on the World Wide Web and new technology products and services that are practical, easy to use and affordable. Graham was later named managing editor of PARADE and now serves as general manager. “Inside.com” became the “Gadget Guide” in 2001 and is now written by Robert Moritz.

After two decades as editor of PARADE, Anderson was named chairman, publisher, and chief executive officer of Parade Publications, succeeding Carlo Vittorini, who retired in February 2000. Lee Kravitz, founding editor of react magazine and a former editor at Scholastic, Inc., was named editor of PARADE.

In his years at the helm of PARADE, Kravitz has brought several renowned writers to the pages of PARADE, including Pat Conroy, Michael Crichton, Bruce Feiler, Ben Fong-Torres and Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Jeffrey Marx. He also introduced three new columns to PARADE readers in 2004: “What’s Cookin,” by PARADE Food Editor Sheila Lukins, highlights the latest trends in the food industry; “PARADE Picks,” by Gerri Hirshey, features the latest in books, CDs, DVDs and videogames; and in “Snapshot,” PARADE publishes readers’ photographs, which will be assembled into a national exhibit.

Carlo Vittorini, formerly the president of Charter Publishing Co., became the president and chief executive officer of PARADE Publications in late 1979. Vittorini assumed the additional title of publisher of PARADE Magazine when Warren J. Reynolds, PARADE publisher since 1967, retired on June 30, 1983.

John J. Beni, who had been president of Parade Publications since January 1996, was promoted to vice chairman and chief operating officer in November 2000. He had previously been senior vice president and general manager for the New York Division of Cahners Publishing Company, where he was responsible for 15 consumer and trade publications.

Jack Griffin joined PARADE in January 1999 as senior vice president of sales and marketing. With a strong background in newspapers, magazines, television and online media, Griffin led the company through a successful year and, in March 2000, was promoted to executive vice president and general manager. Eight months later, he was named president of PARADE. By the time he left the company in 2003, Grifin had also assumed the title of publisher.

Griffin was succeeded as President and Publisher of PARADE by Randy Siegel, who joined the magazine in 2001 as Senior Vice President of Sales and Development. Since then, as a key member of the PARADE senior management team, Siegel has been a driving force in creating new business strategies in a number of critical areas, including advertising, marketing and promotion. Siegel has also been instrumental in forging and solidifying long-term relationships with advertising and agency clients, as well as PARADE’s newspaper partners.

In 2002, under Siegel’s direction, PARADE launched its first-ever television advertising campaign to build brand awareness nationwide. Siegel also directed the sales, marketing and communications efforts for The Great American Bake Sale, a program presented jointly by PARADE and Share Our Strength, a leading national anti-hunger organization. Program sponsors have included ABC Television, Betty Crocker and Tyson Foods, Inc.

In July 2004, under his leadership, PARADE returned to the New York City market after an absence of nine years via an exclusive distribution contract with the New York Post. PARADE can also be found in such newspapers as The Los Angeles Times, The Chicago Tribune, The Philadelphia Inquirer, San Francisco Chronicle, The Boston Globe, The Washington Post, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Miami Herald, The Dallas Morning News, Houston Chronicle and hundreds more.