Ebony Magazine: How John H. Johnson Broke Invisible Racial Identity Barriers

Ebony Magazine: How John H. Johnson Broke Invisible Racial Identity Barriers Elijah Ingram Senior Division Paper Length: 1784 Ingram 1 In November of 1942, Johnson H. Johnson started what would become the most successful black magazine company in American history with his first publication of Negro Digest. With this Johnson paved the way for a new kind of magazine and created a new demographic of readers. With this simple publication, Johnson had broken a barrier that nobody at the time was even aware of. Three years later Johnson Publishing Company released their 1 flagship publication, Ebony and it took the media world by storm. Six years later Ebony's sister publication, Jet, was released. Nobody had thought of making a nationwide magazine for African Americans, so their only representation in the media came from white Americans. With the publication of these magazines, Johnson broke a barrier in African American representation-specifically in the media-and gave African Americans a nationwide voice. Johnson had successfully created an outlet for positive representation of all members of the African American community. Now African Americans weren't only being written about from a biased perspective, their own people were now the writers behind their stories. In the days before Ebony, the overall majority of news regarding African Americans came from all-white outlets, from racist headlines to outright slander, the black image in the media was altogether negative. Now oppressive racial discrimination in the media was not the only representation of African Americans, for now, there was a new source for black cultural empowerment in the country. Johnson’s publication of Ebony magazine brought in a new era of black power and black pride for the country. John H. Johnson grew up in a time when there was no equality between blacks and whites. Being born in 1918, he, unfortunately, had to live through a horrific time for African 1 See Appendix A. Ingram 2 Americans. The Jim Crow ideology was as strong as ever, The Ku Klux Klan had been revived, and race riots and lynchings such as the 1919 Red Summer and the Tulsa riots that together left 2 an estimated 300 African Americans dead, were rampant across the United States. Johnson spent his early years in Arkansas City, Arkansas, where there were no high schools that allowed black students. This led Johnson to repeat the 8th-grade multiple times in an attempt to continue his education. In 1933 Johnson and his family moved to Chicago where he finally got the 3 opportunity to attend high school. Johnson graduated with honors and, not long after graduating, began working at Supreme Life Insurance Company, an insurance company that provided affordable insurance for African Americans. In a time when even healthcare was segregated Johnson was hit with the reality of all the things that white people had, yet blacks lacked. Johnson wrote articles for Supreme Life Company, which not only reinvigorated his passion for publishing that had come to fruition back in his high school yearbook class but also inspired him to want to make an all-black business of his own. Johnson conceived the idea of Negro Digest while working at Supreme Life. Though he was employed, he didn’t have enough money to bring his vision of the black Reader’s Digest to life. Thankfully, his mother allowed him to use her furniture in her house as security for a 500 dollar loan he took out to start his business. Nobody backed up Johnson with his idea so when he finished the first issue of Negro Digest, he had trouble getting it distributed. In 1942, nobody saw profit in African American magazines, and they weren’t exactly the most popular either. The only other black magazine at the time was The Crisis, the official magazine of the NAACP 2 Richard Warner, "Computations as to the Deaths from the 1921 Tulsa Race Riot" (unpublished manuscript, January 10, 2000) 3 John Harold Johnson and Lerone Bennett, Jr., Succeeding Against The Odds (n.p.: Johnson Publishing Company, 1989) Ingram 3 started by the famous W.E.B Du Bois. Sales of Negro Digest were initially low, only selling only 3,000 copies. But with each subsequent issue, the magazine became increasingly popular and the distribution area broadened. And with the publication of the renowned column, “If I Were a Negro” the true scale of the magazine became apparent. With contributions from many prominent citizens to reflect on current racial issues, including the current First Lady, Eleanor Roosevelt, the world was soon forced to see the reality of life for African Americans in the 4 United States. “If I were a Negro, I think I would have moments of great bitterness”, she said. It was at this moment that it became apparent that Johnson had created not only a stable magazine, but an influential one. Before this, nobody had thought an African American magazine would be successful, but time and time again John H. Johnson proved them wrong. With the overwhelming success of his first magazine, Johnson decided to make a new magazine, one that would look more like Life magazine, and the journalism world changed forever. Johnson had taken the initial idea of Negro Digest and reinvented it with Ebony. Ebony focused on successful black entrepreneurs and businessmen and women, looking at the success stories of black people in the segregated day to day life, and altogether empowered African Americans across the country and gave them a view into the realistic and positive side of black life in America. When Ebony was first published in November of 1945, all 25,000 sold out 5 incredibly fast. Large companies quickly took notice of Ebony's success and saw it as an opportunity to advertise towards the black demographic. Companies like Coca-Cola, Budweiser, 4 John Harold Johnson and Eleanor Roosevelt, "Freedom: Promise or Fact," Negro Digest, October 1943, 8-9. 5 Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica, "John H. Johnson," Encyclopaedia Britannica, last modified January 15, 2020, accessed April 21, 2020, https://www.britannica.com/biography/John-H-Johnson#ref809361. Ingram 4 and many tobacco companies all commissioned ads that featured African Americans enjoying their products. This was yet another feat for the company for it brought the inclusion of African Americans into advertising. As Ebony grew in popularity the magazine expanded its reach by showcasing and writing about black actors/actresses, athletes, politicians, and artists. With this development, more and more black stories were being told. Ebony became a showcase for black triumph in business, activism, politics, and beauty. Covers for the magazine always consisted of black influencers, and the articles inside were filled to the brim with black power. With the publication of lists spotlighting successful and influential African Americans, Ebony helped showcase the best of the best over the years. In the introduction to their 1993 Top 100 list, the Ebony Team said "...the nature of Black influence has changed, and the number of Black 6 influence-wielders has grown appreciably", when reflecting on their initial 1963 Top 100 list. As the Civil Rights Movement rose in notoriety, Ebony magazine was there to cover every story in the fight for equal rights. As the years went on Ebony and Johnson Publishing Company as a whole grew and expanded greatly. Over time, Ebony shifted its focus more towards its female audience, and with this, hit its peak of success. With the inclusion of hundreds of black models, Ebony had become the source of what the definition of black beauty truly was and soon came up with a whole new way to show the world what it was. With this came the Ebony Fashion Fair, yet another extension to Johnson Publishing Company. The Ebony Fashion Fair was started by Eunice Johnson, John Johnson’s wife, in 1958. Johnson Publishing Company had set out to show the world what black culture really was and even redefined it. Black models would travel the U.S with crowds of up to 6 "100 Most Influential Black Americans and Organization Leaders," Ebony, May 1993, 36-50. Ingram 5 5,000 coming to attend the fashion shows. Though fear of racist backlash caused many changes to the tour such as removing the Ebony Fashion Fair logo from the bus that they toured on. One model said, "It almost felt like steam coming up from the pavement. You could just feel it," Handy says. "Our name was on our bus at one time ... Ebony Fashion Fair. And I remember them 7 taking our name off the bus so as not to call attention." Another unseen problem soon arose over the years, models that participated "were mixing their own foundations because they had trouble 8 finding makeup to match their own complexion", Eunice Johnson noticed, as there were no makeup companies at the time that made makeup for women with darker skin. Companies once again didn’t see any success in creating anything made specifically for African Americans and continued to choose the racist idea of segregating goods. To overcome this new obstacle, Eunice 9 started up her own makeup line designed specifically for women of color. Another giant barrier broke. Along with Ebony Magazine, Fashion Fair makeup is still in production to this day. As JPC continued to grow, the more impact they had on African American society and America as a whole. John H. Johnson passed away on August 8th, 2005, leaving his daughter; Linda Johnson Rice, to take his position as CEO. Nine years later in 2014, Jet ceased magazine production and became only accessible through the internet. Two years after that in an attempt to avoid the liquidation of the publishing company, JPC sold its historic Chicago office, and then inevitably, its publications of Ebony and Jet to a firm called the `Clear View Group'.

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