Dilettantes at the Gate: Fortune Magazine and the Cultural Politics of BusinessJournalism in the 1930s

Kevin S. Reilly•

Departmentof History Universityof Massachusetts-,'lmherst

During an interviewwith a Fortuneresearcher in the late 1940s,the impos- ing BethlehemSteel chairman EugeneGrace inquired about the Davenport boys, the children of his former company colleague,, Sr. One of Davenport'ssons had servedas Fortune's managing editor and the other was an important staff editor throughout the 1940s."Well," the researcher offered,"Russell is writing poetry and John of courseis writing for Fortune." After a thoughtful moment Grace replied, "I knew their father well. A fine man. I alwayswondered why those boys neverwent to work" [Donoran, 1989, pp. 112-13]. This corporateexecutive's reaction was one in a long Anglo-Americantra- dition of characterizingthe writer as dilettante,but writers,of course,do work. They areusually subject to the sameeconomic pressures as other skilledwork- ers and they inhabit a literary labor market. Like everyoneelse in the years before World War II, writers were enmeshed in the social transformation sparkedby industrializationand corporateexpansion [West, 1988, pp. 9-14; Biel, 1992, pp. 11-53;Weber, 1997].The rise of advertisingfor massproduced retail goodsin the late 19th centuryled to a publicationboom in masscircu- lation magazines.Even the most talentednovelists earned much, if not most, of their livelihood from serializedfiction. By the 1920s,literary modernism owed someof its emergenceto the consumermagazines which helpedsustain famousfigures like F. Scott Fitzgerald,Ernest Hemingway, and John Dos Passos [Ohmann, 1996, p. 91; Strasser1989, Chap. 4; Wilson, 1985, pp. 40-62; West, 1988, pp. 43-44, 103-13]. The establishmentof large culture industriesin years after World War I brought the estrangedworlds of artist and businessexecutive together in new ways.Fortune magazine was part of a corporateexpansion in publishing,a lit- erarymarket that openedopportunities for youngwriters of all stripes.Fortune

' Thiswork is drawnfrom a dissertationin progressentitled "Corporate Stories: Fortune Magazine and the Makingof a ModernManagerial Culture," under the directionof KathyPeiss. The authorwould like to thankPhilip Scranton for hishelpful comments. ! also thank the Department of Historyand the Graduate Schoolof the Universityof Massachusetts-Amherst,andthe Centerfor the Studyof the AmericanSouth at the Universityof North Carolina4EhapelHill for financialsupport. BUSINESS,'INDECONOMIC HISTORY, Volume Twenty-eight, no. 2, Winter 1999. Copyright¸ 1999by the BusinessHistory Conference. ISSN 0894-6825 214 / KEVIN S. REILLY magazinewas a cross-roadswhere two emergingworlds met: that of urbanintel- lectualsand that of corporatemanagers. The former was cosmopolitanand heterosocial,the latter...wasusually just skepticalof the former. The writers Fortunecollected on staff were what historian Michael Denning calls "mod- erns,"those who would slideinto the PopularFront during the depressionbut in the late 20s and early 30s they were Ivy Leagueeducated and rather apoliti- cal [Denning, 1996, pp. 58-59, 83-85].All were magazinewriters by avocation only; they werepoets who had to make a living. But duringthe 1930s,Fortune engagedin a cultural,as well as a political, dialoguewith elite executives.In this exchange,each world contributedelements that would makeFortune sym- bolic of a new modern businesssophistication. This studyargues that Fortunemagazine had a prominentrole in shaping the way professionalbusiness managers imagined themselves-and were imag- ined by others-aspolitical and socialbeings. This particularpaper leaves aside many key elementsof that formation,to focuson the productionof represen- tationsof business.It offersa narrativeof businessengagement with modernism that assumesthe centralityof culturein corporatecapitalism. In 1975Louis Galambos concluded his studyof businessand publicopin- ion with the unhappyrealization that he and other businesshistorians had too often focusedon powerand organizationwhile leavingbelief systemsto other fields.They neededto view cultureas a causeof businessbehavior, not just an effect [Galambos, 1975, p. 264]. There have been recent businesshistories which addressculture, analyzing advertising themes, the effectsof youth cul- ture on business,and the genderedelements of corporatedevelopment [Marchand,1998; Lears, 1994; Frank, 1997;Strom, 1992;Kwolek-Folland, 1994]. Kenneth Lipartito's1995 essay"Culture and the Practiceof BusinessHistory" perhapsmarks the next step in Galambos'scall, by demonstratinghow con- temporarycultural theory forcesus to rethink notions of "rational" decision- makingand organizationalevolution as themselvesculturally contingent con- cepts.For the most part, however,cultural historians have seldomaddressed corporationsas subjects. James Livingston has rightly criticized academic intel- lectualsfor remainingaloof from the taintedfor-profit world, ratherthan treat- ing corporationsas sights of socialand culturalconflicts. "Maybe it's time," he writes,"we lookedin the mirror of corporateculture and recognizedourselves" [Livingston,1995]. Fortunemagazine was the product of a time and place dizzy with binge- ing. New York City in the 1920sattracted minds and money.As a publishing centerit drew intellectuals,artists, and writers,many of whom earnedmoney from both bohemian"little magazines"and the commercial"slicks." The city was the new global banking capital, and it encouragedin Manhattan the developmentof dazzlingoffice towers.At the sametime, urbanleisure activ- ities like film houses,amusement parks, and speakeasiesseemed to be chisel- ing awayat someof Victorian culture'smore oppressivedimensions. The jobs and jazzy atmosphereappealed to a new crop of collegegraduates and inde- DILETTANTESAT THE GATE/ 215 pendent writers; and the lush economic times appealedto young entrepre- neurs and speculators. Where intellectual adventure met businessacumen, you had Henry tL Luce. Henry Luce spent his childhood in with his missionaryparents but returned to the United States to be educated at Hotchkiss and Yale. He puzzledover his futurewhile at Yale,unsure whether to pursuehis literarygifts or settlefor the more comfortablelife he was assuredin business.After a year in Oxford and a little more in newspapers,Luce rejoinedhis Yale Daily Ne'•s colleagueBriton Hadden. They fulfilled an old plan to publish a newsmaga- zine. In 1923they cameout with Time.The weeklymagazine basically repack- agednews printed in TheNew •brk Timesto makereading more "efficient."Time found an upper-middleclass audience, and by 1930 its circulationclimbed to three hundred thousand. When Luce took full control of the successful com- pany after Hadden'sdeath in 1929,he followedthrough on plansto publisha businessmagazine-Fortune-one he describedas the "absolutemost beautiful" [Baughman,1987, pp. 8-61;Elson, 1968, pp. 3-122;Herzstein, 1994, pp. 24-55; Swanberg,1972, pp. 1-80]. Henry Lucewas undaunted by the risk of publishinga magazinethat was marketedto a "horizontal" businessaudience. • Luce alwayshad a granderaudi- ence in mind than any trade journal would allow. His thinking, in fact, was lofty, as would becomeevident to everyonein his famousL/fi editorial"The American Century." In the late 1920s,he was focusedon the fundamental effectsthat large scalecorporations were having on classdevelopment as he understoodit. Luce heraldedthe managerialrevolution before it gainedthat popular name, but he worried that professionalmanagers did not understand the implications.He prophesiedto his businesspeers that they would eventu- ally havenetworks of colleagueswho all spokethe samelanguage, and wereless and lessdissimilar "as to background,taste, and generalcomportment." By 1950 when executivesfrom different industries met, Luce was sure they all would recognizeone another [Jessup,1969, pp. 219-24].This group, he imag- ined, was Fortune'sfertile market of readers. Luce saw himself as a businessprogressive, who wished to elevatemale executivesabove their persistentcrassness so that they might betterfulfill their role as society'snew aristocracy.He wished them to "take in a few less leg showsand a little more literature."These progressivethemes had been suc- cessfulin sellinghis magazineTime throughout the 1920sso he naturallyused them to hype Fortune.As Luce told it, Fortunewould contributeto the sym- bolic universebusinessmen could draw upon to become a professionalmana- gerialclass worthy of its power. Luce discoveredthat to achievehis goal, Fortunewould work best as a devil's advocate.The prevailingbusiness magazines were uncritical and often

2 McGraw-Hillhad made its successpublishing trade journals, but beforeit cameout with Business V•ek(itself inspired by Time)a fewmonths prior to Fortune'sappearance, there was not a competitivemar- ket for generalbusiness magazines [Burlingame, 1959, p. 257]. 216 / KEVIN S. REILLY reliedon ghost-writtenarticles signed by famousnames. The earlyFortune plans went in the same direction,but the tone and method of the magazinewere redefinedduring an experimentalarticle. In Septemberof 1928, Time'sbusiness writer ParkerLloyd-Smith and researcherFlorence Horn attemptedan experi- mental story on InternationalTelephone and Telegraph.ITT's secretiveman- agerscompletely stone-walled them. Nonetheless,the teamwas able to produce a thorough and detailedarticle using public materials.Hoyd-Smith noted their discoveryto Luceand a few monthslater Lucesubmitted a prospectusto the Time Inc. directorsthat completelydenigrated the prevailingbusiness maga- zinesfor their clich•s,dullness, and use of"Great Name" articles[Elson, 1968, pp. 127-29].Not long after this, Lucewas chastisingan audienceof Rochester businessmenfor not recognizingtheir rightful inheritanceas the new dominant class,and for havinga "presscomplex" that renderspotent men "kittenishas a Victorian subdeb"[Jessup, 1969, pp. 222-23]. Circulatingin the world of advertisingand public relations,Luce was com- fortable acting as a liaisonto the managershe thought were too timid in the faceof modernculture. Time Inc.'sorganization into departmentswas inspired by industrialmanufacturing, but Lucewas also informed about the latestbusi- nessstrategies in sales,especially the value of market researchand promotion. Much of it he learned from Time Inc. director Samuel Meek who was a Yale friend and a risingexecutive at the J. WalterThompson agency. Luce's aesthetic sensewas also born of 1920sadvertising. It was on a visit to the J. Walter Thompson offices in 1929 that he came acrossphotographs by Margaret Bourke-White,the rising industrialphotographer from .Luce hired her to be Fortune'sstar. In short, becauseof Luce'splace in New York pub- lishing,Fortune emerged from the atmosphereof commercialculture. [Elson, 1968, pp. 10, 11].3 Fortune'sfirst article was meant to set the tone for the magazine'sconfi- dent modernism[Fortune, February 1930, pp. 55-61].The article(on Swift and Company) establishedthe form of journalismthat Fortunebecame most well- known for: the corporationstory. In the openingspread, the left hand pageis coveredby the cartooneddiagram of a pig floatingover a dwarfedtable of for- mally dresseddiners. The smilingpig is subdividedwith dottedarrows and the namesof meat cuts. "Such a map," the caption explains,"guides the packers of Packingtownas they slice into profitable partitions, 8,000,000 pigs each year."Swift and Company was notable becauseit had just reached1 billion dollarsin grosssales, but the intensecompetition and resultingprice fluctua- tions held its earnings,like that of most packers,to under 2%. The writer, ParkerLloyd-Smith, saw the miracleof Swift in its dynamic"race against time,

3?ortune's young circulation manager P. I. Prenticewas a masterof promotion,as well. See, "Fortune Circulation,"Presentation to AdvertisingSales Staff by PerryPrentice, 25 April 1939,RWD, Box55, f. 6; On Fortuneart directorT. M. Cleland'sadvertising work see, Cleland to Luce,26 September1931; Luce to Cleland,9 October1931; and Lloyd-Smith to Cleland,15 July 1929, all in Box 13,T.M. ClelandPapers [TMC], Manuscriptsand Archive Division, Library of Congress,Washington, D.C [LOCI. DILETTANTES AT THE GATE / 217 againstthe uncertaintyof the marketsand the certaintyof eventualdeteriora- tion." Unlike farmerswho usedthe naturallaws of biology,Swift met the pigs on industrialterms. It submittedthe organicbounty of the land to "profitable partitions." Fortune'searly form of photojournalismwas patterned on line production. To demonstratethe geniusof system,Lloyd-Smith narrates us through the cir- cuitry of the packingprocess. Visually we beginand end wherethe pig begins and ends.The final pageof the articleis a dark imageof warehousedby-prod- uct describedas "pig dust, macabremounds of meal." The verbal and visual narrativesconformed to the logic of the manufacturingprocess. This visual devicewas central to the businessjournalism Fortune initially practiced. We wit- nessproduction intimately as if hoveringin impossiblepositions within the machineitself, observing and accompanyingthe inevitableflow of food. These visual layouts are meant to shatterour senseof intimacy with products of mythical(in this caseagricultural) or artisanalproduction. But Fortune'snarrative form alsoattempts a new aestheticof intimacywith industrialproduction. Accompanying the text of the Swift articleare Bourke- White's typicallysensual photographs. ("She made evenmachines look sexy," was 'ssardonic memory of her work. [Goldberg,1986, p. 104]) Bourke-White'sFortune images were the kind LewisHine would dismiss as "merephotographic jazz." By combiningthe abstractionof industrialpro- ductionwith modernistaesthetics, she countered the moral photographyof a LewisHine which focusedon the human toll of industry[Goldberg, 1986, 79- 112; Callahan, 1972;T. Smith, 1993, pp. 190-96;Guimond, 1991,pp. 89-94, Hine quoted p. 92]. Bourke-Whitemeticulously prepared surfaces and engi~ neeredcamera positions in order to isolateengaging patterns from industrial settings.That her corporateadvertising photographs would sometimesappear in the sameissue of Fortuneas her journalismwork only emphasizesthe aes- thetic impulseat work here.This wasa packagingfor productionitself. The visualimpact of the magazineis evidentin the receptionit received by journalistsand critics.Fortune reprinted review blurbs including one from The New 33rk7•'rnes which, perhaps ironically, wrote that "it goesCarl Sandberg one betterin poeticizingthe stockyards of Chicago."Even skepticspraised Fortunefor its "inquiry,"its "explorations,"its "graphicdepictions." Only writ- ers on the political left read the aestheticsas evidenceof deception.It "dis- guise[d]the...swinishness of American'Big Business',"wrote one suchreviewer [Fortune,April 1930, p. 137; Swanberg,1972, p. 85]. The politicsof Fortuneis foundmainly in its literaryand visual form before 1933 or '34. Neither the Ivy Leagueliterary circles nor the Time Inc. offices wereparticularly excited by politicsor political economyuntil the mid-1930s. The earlyyears, then weremarked by a criticalvoice that wasborn of a cul- tural dividebetween managers and writers,rather than capitalistand socialist. Only as the New Deal becamecontentious and Europeanpolitics more threat- ening would the iconoclastson staff move into radical circles.Yes, these writ- ers were skepticalabout corporatepower if they thought about it at all. 218 / KEVIN S. REILLY

Usually,however, they were simplyuninspired by philistinebusinessmen and Fortune'sinterest in them, and entertainedthemselves by writing with irony. Many on the magazine'sstaff emergedout of a bohemianor intellectual modernism.In Fortune'sfirst year,almost every Time Inc. manager,editor, and writer associatedwith the magazine was under the age of 33. Archibald MacLeish was the veteran writer at 38. Almost all of these individuals had been educatedat Yale, Harvard, or Princeton.There was a generationalfeel to the companyand the magazine.These were young white men with elite educations all of whom were comingof agein New York. While their privilegedback- groundscontributed to both arroganceand naivet•,their earlycareers afford- ed a cosmopolitanawakening. They werequickly educated in writing,publish- ing, advertising,and radicalpolitics. Beyond absorbing the Zeitgeist,they were the friendsand acquaintancesof the whole spectrumof intellectualsand cul- tural figureswho Ann Douglashas describedas the "shocktroops of moder- nity" [Douglas,1995, p. 28]. A good exampleof the culturalpolitics at work in the earlyFortune can be seenin the impact of Ralph Ingersoll.There was concern about ParkerLloyd- Smith as managingeditor becausehe was an eccentricpoet with no organiza- tional skills.Luce was steeredto an organizededitor named Ralph Ingersoll, who was known in New York publishingfor keepingtogether Harold Ross's new and somewhattroubled magazineThe New Yorker.Ingersoll's biggest suc- cessat TheNew Yorkerwas that he had redesignedand editedthe "Talk of the Town" sectionwhich offeredwitty banterand gossipabout New York social life. He was inexperiencedwhen he started,but receivedadvice on collecting informationfrom a young EdwardBernays who told him that he had to find the "one gossipyindividual" in eachworld who was usuallya "frustratedsec- ond-stringeror some boss'ssecretary." Ingersoll soon developedinformants, the most important beinggossip columnist Walter Winchell who he met reg- ularlyat the Yale Club [Kunkel,1995, pp. 122-23;Hoopes, 1985,quote p. 68]. Ingersoll'sexperience with the art of sophisticatedgossip led him to use Fortune'svisual reportagein provocativenew ways.It was the Europeanillus- trated magazineswhich first inspiredU.S. publishersto increasetheir use of photographs.A Germannamed Erich Salomongained particular fame for his "candid camera" photojournalism, which caught German aristocratsand politiciansin unguardedmoments. The Hearstpapers brought him overin the late 1920sand Ingersollbrought Salomonto Fortunefor a few months in 1930 [Carlebach,1997, pp. 174-76,187; Hunter-Salomon, 1967]. 4 Ingersollwas obvi- ouslyintrigued by the new idea, eventaking his own candidphoto of Henry Luce with a camerahe concealedin his office bookshelves.The very idea of candid imagesappealed to Ingersoll'ssense of intrigue. The candid photo-

• For specificinfluences of Europeanmagazines and photographers at Time Inc. seeC. Smith,1988; Mullenand Beard, 1985, p. 3; Lloyd-Smithto Cleland,30 March1929, Box 13,and Treacy memo to Luce, Ingersoll,Grover, 6 October1931, Box 11 both in TMC. DILETTANTESAT THE GATE / 219 graphprovided the scintillatingpower of catching(or seemingto catch)some- one unaware. The aestheticsof tabloid photographyand irreverentpersonal anecdotes were put to increasinguse by Fortune'syoung staff. BeforeWorld War II, cor- poratemanagement seldom exposed itself to the public eyewithout strict con- trol of the imagery,but Fortunepushed against that silenceas the depression woreon. In the December1933 issue, Fortune published a corporationstory by Ed Kennedywhich profiled the agingHenry Ford and his company[Fortune, December1933, pp. 62-69ff.].The narrativefollows him with slightbemusement throughhis GreenfieldVillage where he might "call up one of his oldtimefid- dlersand havehim play someoldtime music-perhaps while he skipssolemnly through the measuresof an old-time waltz, all by himself."In the Saturday EveningPost this might haveread like adoringdrivel. Here it wasclearly ironic. The name of the piece,"Mr. Ford Doesn't Care," refersto Henry Ford'sobliv- iousnessto his competitors.He is depicted as an antiquated,if respectable, machinist.He "goesthrough the motions" of salesmanship,we are told, "but his heart is not reallyin them." Publishedwith the text are RussellAikins' pho- tographswhich are introducedin their own inset box. The descriptionheralds the wondersof the "peepholelens" in allowingus to seethese powerful man- agersmore objectivelyand without posing. Imagesseem poached from per- spectivesthat would otherwisebe off-limits:one photographallowing us an imaginedpresence at a managementmeeting. The article tries to reinforcethe senseof covertnessby citing EdselFord as the sourceof statisticalinformation that explainsmore, we are led to believe,about Ford'ssubordinate relationship to its competitorsthan even Henry Ford knows.Another imagedrives home the point. An informal shot of Ford relaxingwith his feet on a colleague'sdesk is reframedby the captiontelling us that his own office is usedfor napping. The useof irony heremakes Henry Ford'sown attemptsto conveyhis common- man hero imageseem like a tragicfarce. The photograph-textlayout recasts his folksyimage as mere dotage[cf. T. Smith, 1993,pp. 168-70].5 Fortune'scultural skirmisheswith family-ledindustry were especiallyevi- dent in its three-partseries on DuPont. Managingeditor Ingersollapproached Lammot du Pont in April 1934 in the usualway: writing a letter outlining the plans and requestingassistance. DuPont instinctivelyinstructed his publicity managerto decline.As Fortuneproceeded with the articles,du Pont worried about coverageof the du Pont family. He insistedthat they were outsidethe boundsof businessjournalism. To understandthe curiousphenomena of cor- porations,Ingersoll explained, it was"necessary to synthesizeall its parts,...and, emphatically,its personalities."After being reassuredabout Fortuneby Roy Durstine, a DuPont advertisingmanager and Henry Luce friend, Lammot du Pont reluctantlyagreed to assistthe writerswith the first of three articles-

5Though my emphasisis different,I amindebted to TerrySmith's reading of thisarticle, and his bril- liantreading of Fortune'splace within the mainstreamof modernistaesthetics generally. I do, however,dif- ferwith hispolitical assessment of Fortune as simply a "journalof thenew corporatism." 220 / KEVIN S. REILLY the one which discussedthe family.Dozens of objectionswere noted evenin a reviseddraft. The generaltenor of the criticismswas summedup in the reviewer'srepeated use of the phrase:that it "savorsof the tabloid? The chargeof sensationalismraises historically loaded issues of power. Therewere two dominantaesthetics in Fortune'scoverage of businessand pol- iticsduring the earlyand mid-1930s.The first, partiallyinfluenced by the urban journalismof the 1920s,was the useof personalanecdotes or whatsome would call gossip.The otherwas the useof ironywhich was a centraltrope in post- World War I literature.Both havetheir politics.Gossip has the ability to scan- dalize an individualwhen circulatedamong a group with sharedvalues. Institutionalizedin a periodical,knowledge about an executive'ssocial life becamepart of a businessstory and thereforechallenged the public/private bordersof businessfigures the way New Deal policieswould challengethat borderfor the corporationas a legalentity. Gossip in thisway had a light-heart- ed policingabout it. It redefinedthe communityof onlookersby scandalizing the "backward"manager. It was able to accomplishthis without the revolt of its readership,I would argue,because the relianceon irony as a mode of writ- ing allowed readersto feel comfortablysuperior to the scandalized.Irony bringsa readerinto the voice of the onlooker.The culturalsophistication of Fortune'swriters allowed them to criticize through humor and mild conde- scension,which carriedtheir readersalong as confidants[Scott, 1990, pp. 142- 43; Murphy, 1984, pp. 65-66;Fussell, 1975, pp. 3-35; Hutcheon, 1995]. Another reasoncompanies like DuPont reactedwith hostilityto Fortune's reportingwas because of the obviouspolitical implications of businesspublicity in the 1930s.For the most part, the feelingamong many managers in the mid- 1930swas that Fortunewas simply to be avoided,probably with the samedread onesees in the facesof peoplesurprised by a "60 Minutes"news crew [Drucker, 1979,pp. 231-31;Kobler, 1968, pp. 87-88;Elson, 1968, pp. 144-46,149-50]. 7 What theseexamples show is that part of the powerof Fortune'sbusiness journalismwas that it seldomtook the manufacturedpublic imageof an exec- utive or a corporationat facevalue. Fortune was never allowed to be anti-pri- vatebusiness, but evenwhen articleswere not particularlycritical, the subjects often seemedupset. These New York sophisticatesfrustrated the attemptsof mangersto control their own symbolism.Roland Marchandhas shownhow the largeU.S. industrialfirms weredeveloping public relationsprograms in theseyears. Fortune's staff enjoyed critiquing such campaigns. In the earlydays of publicrelations, this musthave seemed vaguely subversive. Fortune's style was

• Thisparagraph is basedon the Fortunecorrespondence file in E. I. DuPontde Nemours& Co., PublicAffairs Department [DPPA], Box 38, and DuPont,Administrative Papers [DPAP], Box 7, both at HagleyMuseum and Library, Wilmington, Delaware; and Ingersoll to R. Davenport,30 September1935, RussellWheeler Davenport Papers [RWD], Box 55, folder 18, LOC. ForLammot du Pont'saversion to per- sonalpublicity see Marchand, 1998, p. 219. 7 For examplesof publicrelations experts attempts to useFortune see also William A. Hart to Roy Durstine,18 June 1934,Box 38, DPPA;and Ann Tobiasto R. Davenport,26 January1940 and reply29 January1940, Box 54, folder 11,RWD. DILETTANTESAT THE GATE/ 221 a shockingcontrast to the hackneyedpuffery of Victorian advicemanuals or their magazinedescendants like Forbesand Nation5Business. But this stylemust alsohave openedup a more cosmopolitanvision of businessto its readers.It allowedthem to stepbehind the scenesof corporateidentities created for the averageconsumer, to put things in a broad context,to be one of the culture critics. It provided both the information and the languagenecessary for busi- nessmento envisiontheir rolesin the historicaldevelopment of Americanbusi- ness.In this sense,Fortune's cultural critique of businessallowed it to function as a manualof stylefor a growingcorps of professionalmanagers [Kaufman, et al., 1995,pp. 125-36]. The youngurban sceneof Manhattan'scommercial and literarylife creat- ed Fortune'sappeal to managers.The readersof Fortunewere usually oblivious to all of the influencesof Manhattanpolitical life-to the specificintellectual debatesand ideologicalpositioning that went on in Fortunethroughout the 1930s.8 Nonetheless,the hybrid magazinethat emergedfrom poetstouring fac- torieswas an important cultural markerfor the executivewith a modern self- image. The visual and verbal languagethat made that possiblegrew out of GreenwichVillage salonsand the cocktail party wit of professionalwriters. A numberof things changedthe tenor of the magazineafter 1938 as it moved from a goal of beingabout businesstoward its beingfor business.But during the chaoticyears of the depression,Fortune broke through the dark silenceof the corporationwith hecklesand snickers.What the audienceof Fortunegot in return was a pre-fashionedself-image: the powerful administratorsof modern businessfinally drapedin the garb of modern culture.

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