Recent Articles – Page 123 – Old Magazine Articles

NBC and CBS Open Shop on the West Coast
(Literary Digest, 1936)

In order to take advantage of the local talent abiding in the sleepy film colony of Hollywood, the far-seeing executives at NBC and CBS saw fit to open radio and television broadcasting facilities in that far, distant burg.

The trek to Hollywood of the Broadcasting companies began in earnest last winter when the National Broadcasting Company opened a large building – fire-proof, earthquake-proof, sound-proof and air-conditioned.

Wyndham Lewis Gets Panned
(The Spectator, 1921)

An unnamed art critic writing for the British magazine SPECTATOR gave his back-hand to Wyndham Lewis, the father of Vorticism. Prefering the artist’s drawings to his paintings, the ink-stained wretch opined:

The point might also be raised whether Mr. Wyndham Lewis should ever use oil paint. It is a medium which he seems to have little capacity and no sympathy…

Seussue Hayakawa
(Photoplay Magazine, 1916)

The attached article is about Sessue Hayakawa (1889 – 1973), the first Asian actor to achieve star status in Hollywood:

No, Sessue Hayakawa, the world’s most noted Japanese photoplay actor, does not dwell in a papier-mache house amid tea-cup scenery. He is working in pictures in Los Angeles, and he lives in a ‘regular’ bungalow, furnished in mission oak, and dresses very modishly according to American standards.

For the Promotion of Good Manners
(Literary Digest, 1900)

Americans of the mid-Nineteenth Century who entertained any social ambitions at all were totally at a loss as to how they might find their place in the business world, much less the swank and pomp of polite society, if they were without any understanding as to the manners required to open these doors. Unable to benefit from such T.V. shows as Dallas or Dynasty and finding that Emily Post was no where in view, they found a reliable ally in a collection of pamphlets briefly published by the firm of Beadle & Adams.

The 1908 New York – Paris Race: Bumpy Ride
(Literary Digest, 1908)

With the centennial re-running of the New York to Paris race beginning this May (2008), it is interesting to read about the authentic 1908 contest and the difficulties they faced in a world without proper roads.

Interest in the New York – to – Paris race, temporarily suspended by the failure to find a passable road in Alaska…

Shoe Illustrations
(1913 Advertisement)

Heartlessly ripped from the binding of an ancient issue of VANITY FAIR was this page of shoe illustrations in which a smart pair of womens leather boots are the centerpiece, accompanied by Russian dancing shoes, a splendid pair of gold brocade slippers, white buckskin tennis oxfords and a pair of walking boots.

Legendary fashion designer Christian Dior had a good deal of trouble with people who would illegally copy his designs; click here to read about that part of fashion history.

1920s Prohibition created a criminal climate
that appealed to more women than you ever might have suspected…

Marcel Duchamp Returns to New York City
(Vanity Fair, 1915)

Exempted from serving with the French military in World War I, the artist Marcel Duchamp returned to New York City where he triumphed during the Armory Show of 1913 – together he and his two brothers, Raymond Duchamp-Villon and Jacques Villon, all showed their groundbreaking art. Marcel was the toast of New York and his modern painting, Nude Descending a Staircase was regarded as a masterwork.

In the attached VANITY FAIR article, Duchamp let’s it be known that he crossed the submarine-infested waters of the Atlantic to see American art.

New Portrait Busts by Jo Davidson
(Vanity Fair, 1916)

This single column reported on the 1916 busts that were created by the American sculptor Jo Davidson (1883 – 1952), during his tour of war-torn Europe.
By the end of the Twentieth Century, much of his work would be in the collections of many of the finest art museums, such as the National Gallery of Art, Washington, the Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco, the U.S. Senate Art Collection and the National Statuary Hall, both in Washington.

World War I Fashions: Summer, 1916
(Vanity Fair Magazine, 1916)

Ignoring the general unpleasantness taking place outside of town, the taste-makers of Paris soldiered-on as best they could, creating garments for the summer of 1916 that were both original and feminine and bore the mark of Paris’ characteristic opulence.

Click here to read about the New York fashions of 1916.

Paris Puts a Stick in the Mode…(Vogue Magazine, 1919)

Fashion, like all empires, has it’s slaves. The slaves are treated cruelly but, strangely, they never seem to mind; they do what ever is required of them. Many are the examples of fashion’s tyranny: in the past it has demanded that it’s slaves wear cowboy boots, although none could rope a steer, and it has demanded of it’s slaves that they wear uniforms, although none could fight. In fashion’s name the slaves have removed ribs and teeth, reduced or enlarged body parts, dyed hair cross-dressed and tattooed themselves like jail-birds. The slaves do it all and there seems to be no limit to fashion’s fickle whims that will ever make them say, no.

To illustrate this point, you can read this beautifully illustrated Vogue magazine article from 1919 in which the beast demands perfectly healthy young women to walk with canes.

Hats from the Spring of 1925
(The Delineator, 1925)

Tenderly ripped from a copy of Delineator Magazine was this one page that featured nine chic illustrations of the fashionable hats for the Spring of 1925.

The small hat trimmed on top with an artichoke bow, pom-poms, gardenias, roses, water lilies, violets or quills is very popular…Hats for general wear remain head-size. The large hat is seen occasionally with afternoon gowns and will be worn with more formal Summer frocks.

Click here to see a beautifully photographed article about the fashionable hats of 1947.

Group therapy for weight loss celebrates its 60th year…

The Tennis Blazer
(Vanity Fair Magazine, 1916)

This article dates to a the dear, dead days when tennis balls were white and landscapers (rather than diesel machinery) were relied upon to make tennis courts; it was also a time when the abilities of a skilled tailor were required for tennis clothing. These court-side stylists would not simply monitor the drape of tennis trousers but they would anticipate the unspoken needs of their tennis dandies – and in so doing, the tennis blazer was born.

Cars from Europe Get Tinier
(Vanity Fair Magazine, 1921)

One thing is absolutely certain- Europe is economizing. It must. Everything in the motor world points to an enormous increase in the number of 10 h.p., four cylinder cars and in the even smaller 7-8 h.p. two cylinder machines.

One Cartoonist’s View of Depression Era Hollywood…(Ken Magazine, 1939)

A full page drawing of the sound stage-spangled Hollywood landscape picturing all the usual suspects – the Hollywood glory girls, studio yes-men and sub-literate European starlets -all sweltering beneath the intense heat of the occidental sun.

Click here to see cartoons about the silent movie culture.

Click here to read historic magazine articles about American animated films.

BBC Television Broadcasting Begins
(Literary Digest, 1935)

The British Broadcasting Corporation announced that they were capable of transmitting television programming as early as 1935:

The British engineers plan to begin with a single broadcasting tower, capable of transmitting television images to receiving sets within a radius of about thirty miles…British engineers are not the first to try television broadcasting. A station has been operating regularly in Berlin for several months.

Dance International
(Pathfinder Magazine, 1937)

In New York last week, on the polished floor of the Rainbow Room, Rockefeller Center’s skyscraping night club, Hawaiians, Chinese, Scandinavians and Africans stamped whirled, leaped, and gesticulated to a dozen different kinds of music…it was an exposition of no little cultural and social importance – ‘Dance International,’ a festival showing the progress of the dance in all nations since 1900.

In their quest to document the evolution of dance in the United States, the audiences were treated to Modern Dance performances by Martha Graham, Doris Humphrey, Paul Weidman and Paul Haakon.

Television with All It’s Possibilities
(Stage Magazine, 1939)

There wasn’t a single soul in 1939 would have imagined that television would be the sort of venue that would allow millions of strangers to see Tyra Banks get a breast exam, but that is the kind of institution it has become.

STAGE MAGAZINE correspondent Alan Rinehart was astonished that so much dough was being invested in such a young industry, yet he recognized that T.V. was capable of much good, but was also capable of generating the kind of banality that we’re used to.

What then, will be the entertainment value of television?…What’s to be the entertainment? Why should we tune in? Will we get more than we will on the radio?…The revolutionary idea about television is that the medium has been developed before the art. It’s as if the piano had been invented before music, or paint and canvas before drawing.

The Hollywood Happenings in the Spring of ’44
(Yank Magazine, 1944)

Tenderly ripped from the brittle pages of a 1944 issue of YANK MAGAZINE was this short paragraph which explained all the goings-on within the sun-bleached confines of Hollywood, California:

Rita Hayworth steps into the top spot in the Columbia production, ‘Tonight and Every Night’; Ethel Barrymore returns to the screen after 11 years’ absence to share honors with with Cary Grant in ‘None but the Loney Heart’…In ‘Something for the Boys’ Carmen Miranda will sing ‘Mairzy Doats’… etc, etc, etc.