Today the names of these cover girls are, for the most part, lost to us. One rare exception is the women seen on the April 8, 1911 cover: Dorothy Gibson.

We know her name because she was a favorite subject of Harrison Fisher. And we know her because of a fateful decision she made one year after this magazine cover appeared, when she chose to sail on the RMS Titanic.

Dorothy Gibson, born in Hoboken in 1889, was living with her mother in New York in 1910 when she began to earn a living singing and dancing. Soon she was offered work as a model.  After Harrison Fisher began painting her, Ms. Gibson became one of the iconic beauties of her time, rivaled only by the women drawn by Charles Dana Gibson (no relation).

It wasn’t long before she was approached by some New York film studios. She proved so successful that she was offered a generous contract by the Éclair Company. She starred in several dramas and comedies, including A Lucky Holdup, which premiered the same week she and her mother, returning from a European trip, boarded the RMS Titanic in Cherbourg.

She was walking on deck after an evening of card playing when she felt the deck lurch slightly. Seeing from the ship’s officers that something was wrong, she didn’t return to her cabin but headed straight for a lifeboat.

She was in the first lifeboat lowered to the water, one of just 19 people in a boat designed to hold 65. Another passenger in her life boat recalled, “the sea was perfectly calm—not even a ripple on the surface… suddenly all the lights dipped simultaneously to a pale glow. A moment or two later [we] saw, silhouetted against the star-lit sky, the stern of the ship rise perpendicularly into the air… Then, with a prolonged rush and a roar like ten thousand tons of coal sliding down a metal chute several hundred feet long, the great ship went down… A great cry arose on the air from the surface of the calm sea where the ship had been.”

Ms. Gibson recalled that sound: “I will never forget the terrible cry that rang out from people who were thrown into the sea and others who were afraid for their loved ones.”

Rescued by the Carpathia, she arrived in New York on April 18. Almost immediately she had agreed to a suggestion from the studio’s producer to make a movie of her experiences. Within a week, she was filming Saved from The Titanic, wearing the same evening gown, long sweater, and gloves she’d worn the night she escaped the sinking ship. The ten-minute ‘feature’ movie proved highly successful, but Ms. Gibson soon lost interest in the movies.

She was considering a career in opera when, in 1915, the producer of Éclair Studios was involved in an automobile accident that killed a man. During the subsequent inquiry, the court—and then the public—learned it was Dorothy Gibson, not the producer, who had been driving the car. Worse, she had been having an adulterous affair with the producer for several years.

In the wake of the scandal, the producer divorced his wife and married Gibson but they, too, were divorced just two years later.

Ms. Gibson, still with her mother in tow, lived on her movie residuals and alimony and eventually decided to move to Europe in 1927 where the cost of living was much less. She and her mother lived in France and Italy, ultimately settling in Paris. She was still there when World War II began.

We are unsure of what happened to her over the next few years; her account is vague and sometimes contradictory. Until America entered the war, she had been allowed to visit her mother in Italy. But in 1941, she was suddenly unable to return to her Paris home. At some point, she was arrested, then sent to San Vittore prison in Milan.

She surfaced again in 1944 when she tried to enter Switzerland. She told the American consul in Zurich she had escaped with the help of an Italian official. He had obtained her release by falsely informing Nazi officials in Italy that Ms. Gibson would enter Switzerland to spy for the fascists.

Apparently the allied authorities never determined whether she was pretending to be a spy or was, in fact, a spy for the German occupiers of Italy. She returned to Paris in 1945 and died there in 1946.

She was outlived by her mother, who survived her by 15 years. As Dorothy’s mother grew even more feeble, she grew vocal in her criticism of the allies. She often made antisemitic, pro-Nazi statements, which led some to infer that her daughter, Dorothy, had been a fascist sympathizer. As in so much of her later life, her political sympathies have never been determined.

The Cover Girl on the Titanic The Saturday Evening Post

In our March/April 2012 issue, Frederick E. Allen explores the history of America’s two-party system — an issue that The Saturday Evening Post was talking about more than a hundred years ago. In the following poem from the December 23, 1911 Post, J.W. Foley rhapsodizes about straight-ticket voting.

 
 

I am the Upright Citizen —Taxpayer is my name;
I’m one of the City’s Solid Men and I’m everywhere the same;
I’ve built the sewers and paved the streets, and paid for the parks, you see,
and all the Contractors, Bosses, Beats and Leeches feed on me—
you see, I’m a Regular Party Man—it’s bred in my flesh and bone.
I’ve voted for every Republican since the party has been known
I always vote my ticket straight, though at times it’s a bitter pill;
but I never split it, and I may state that I hope I never will.

Now Smith, next door, is a Democrat, and another Solid Man,
who always knows right where he’s at— and he votes by the selfsame plan ;
and Smith is an Upright Citizen, and his name’s Taxpayer too ;
and as one of the City’s Solid Men he’s down on the Grafting Crew ;
and so am I—so we go to the polls and vote straight down the line :
two square and quite well-meaning men —and his vote offsets mine!

NOW I’ve talked with Smith and he’s talked with me, and we’ve talked quite plainly too;
and I’ve said to him : “Now, Smith, you see, I’m down on this Grafting Crew ;
our man is the man to win the fight—he’s a clean and able man.”
And Smith says: “Yes, I guess that’s right ; but he’s a Republican.
And I always vote my ticket straight from A to Z—that’s how
I’ve always done and it’s getting late to change my methods now.
Our man isn’t what he ought to be—I quite agree in that;
but he’s the party nominee, and you know I’m a Democrat.
So I guess I’ll stick to the good old ship and vote right down the line.”
And Smith makes one cross on his ballot slip—and so his vote kills mine!

SMITH talks with me in the selfsame way, and he says: “This paving job
is a downright steal, I’m free to say ; and our man’s pledged to play hob
with the deal they’ve made and we ought to stand behind him to a man.”
And I know our man has made a trade—but he’s a Republican.
So I say to Smith: “I’d like to vote for your candidate, that’s flat;
but somehow it sticks fast in my throat, for he is a Democrat.

And you know I belong to the G.O.P.—the party of Lincoln and Blaine—
and it ought to be good enough for me; so I’ll vote her straight again.”
And so we go to the polls and vote for the Gods of the Faith That Is—
it’s not just good; but what’s the odds ?—and so my vote kills his!
NOW Smith and I, we mean all right and we want things on the square;
but when there’s a Regular Party Fight, a man must do his share.

My faith comes down from Fremont’s time and his from Jefferson;
and to cling to an old-time faith’s sublime—no odds how the paving’s done!
Sometimes I think his man’s the best—sometimes he thinks mine is;
but I vote straight, north, south, east, west, and he votes straight for his.
We quite agree on little things, like the taxrolls and the streets,
the city schools, police, white wings, and the health of milk and meats;
but when it comes to matters big, like a Regular Party Plank,
why, Smith is stubborn as a pig and I’m somewhat of a crank.
And we’d like to vote alike—and then we could down the Grafting Crew ;
but we’re both Regular Party Men—so what are we going to do?

The Regular Party Man The Saturday Evening Post

Louis J. Horowitz, a developer in the first decades of the 20th Century, embodied the spirit of towering achievement. Arriving in New York in 1892, he came to the States with little more than burning ambition. Beginning as an errand boy earning $3 a week, he would later go on to build New York’s Equitable Building and Waldorf Astoria hotel, and, in 1910, the Woolworth Building. For 20 years, this masterwork would remain the world’s tallest building at 792 feet and a then-astounding 57 stories.  Here is Horowitz’s story, as told in the pages of the Post in 1936:

For a while in that period, I could afford only two meals a day. For breakfast I would get coffee and two doughnuts—these cost only a nickel, but they filled me up. At night I would go to a restaurant where, for fifteen cents, I could get a dish of meat and potatoes and help myself to the bread that was placed on the table. I was always hungry, and I was becoming thinner with each day. I had been delicate for some years, so the wonder is that I lived. As winter came on, time after time, with teeth chattering, I would arise from beneath thin coverings to find that the water in the pitcher on the washstand had turned to ice.

Joseph Pennel's 1908 drawing of the Waldorf-Astoria.(Library of Congress)

By hard work and diligently saving for seven years, Horowitz scraped together $2,000. This, along with a loan for $7,000 enabled him to finance the construction of his first apartment, which he later sold for a profit of $5,000

His success and reputation for ethical work eventually helped him win contracts to build New York’s Waldorf-Astoria hotel and the Equitable Building (pictured above), which, in an event that would weirdly presage the later attack on the World Trade Center, was  struck by an errant missile in 1942. But his greatest achievement was the construction, in 1910, of the Woolworth Building, which remained the world’s tallest building for 20 years. At 792 feet, its 57 stories stretched so high above Manhattan that its upper floors were lost in clouds.

Its construction posed challenges that Horowitz never faced before.

I remember that the steel members were of such heavy weight that we had to survey the routes over which they were to be hauled to the site. We wanted no cave-ins! Below the surface of New York streets, there is a deep and complex mechanical jungle. Raw power in the form of electricity, steam, and gas, is channeled just under all the city’s [traffic]… likewise, down there is a root-like system of wires, pipes and larger tubes that provide means for the transport of everything from the human voice to the human body. We had to give thought to gigantic water mains, subterranean railroads, vaulted sewers… Some of that sub-surface structure lies almost as deep in the rock under New York as the Woolworth Building rises above it.
What we were going to do was to build into the air a structure of equal complexity. Our water supply was to be a vast fountain; our vertical sewer system as large as that of a small town; our railroads—the elevators—were vertical, too.
Scaffolds and hoisting engines of the kind we needed did not exist; we had to create them. Equipment had to be devised to lift loads which never before had been lifted, and to lift them to unprecedented heights. [We had to hoist] all material halfway and then relay it to a second hoisting machine to lift it higher.

Surprisingly, Horowitz was uncomfortable with the idea of skyscrapers, which he considered monuments to personal egos.

The Woolworth Building in 1912.(Library of Congress)

Throughout my career as a builder, I argued… the immorality of uncommonly big buildings. It should be obvious that an extraordinarily large building poaches sunlight and air from smaller neighbors. [Other cities] do not permit the construction of buildings so large that they would hog a disproportionate share of the water supply, sewers, sunlight, air, and transport.
Socially, the gigantic buildings are, to my way of thinking, quite wrong… it would be utterly impossible to cover [even 30%] of Manhattan with tall buildings. The streets could not take care of the traffic of such buildings. The water supply would be inadequate, and the sewers, too. The sidewalks would become a solid mass of suffocating humanity. Such a piece of foolishness is unthinkable, and, anyway, there are not enough people to serve as tenants.
No city was ever meant to contain the buildings of fabulous size—fifty, sixty, seventy stories and more—that have been attached like monstrous parasites to the veins and arteries of New York. Those who create such buildings, in my opinion, are taking an unfair advantage of their neighbors, of their fellow property owners, of their fellow citizens.

Horowitz couldn’t have foreseen how New York, and its population would continue to grow. Just as he couldn’t have imagined that skyscrapers would someday inspire fear and envy among fanatics.

But in the wake of 9/11, he wouldn’t have been surprised by the construction of the new One World Trade Center. When completed in 2013, it will be the world’s tallest office building (and able to withstand the impact of a 747). He probably would have been proud to see the beacon atop its spire, at 1776 feet, flashing out the city’s energy, resolve, and defiance to the world.

Recalling An Earlier ‘Twin Towers’ The Saturday Evening Post

Coachman and Horse by J.F. Kernan

Coachman and Horse
J.F. Kernan
November 29, 1930

If you think I’ve been looking for an excuse to show off this beautiful cover, you’re absolutely right. The coachman and horse is one of my favorites (of course, my favorites change from week to week). Between the Post and sister publication, Country Gentleman, artist J.F. Kernan did over fifty covers.

Billboard Painters by Penrhyn Stanlaws

Partygoers
Norman Rockwell
March 9, 1935

There are several covers depicting billboard painters, and I’d forgotten about this one. It was by artist Penrhyn Stanlaws whose covers of elegant ladies, often in interesting hats, graced the Post many times. This particular lady just happens to be several times life size.

Partygoers by Norman Rockwell

Partygoers
Norman Rockwell
March 9, 1935

The milkman started at the crack of dawn, so if you met him on your way home, you were a bona fide party animal. Note the hard-working deliverer of our morning milk is still carrying his flashlight. Rockwell depicted him as a fatherly type, admonishing the young couple for their unseemly hours.

Blacksmith by L.L. Emmert

Blacksmith
L.L. Emmert
March 31, 1917

Since the Country Gentleman magazine folded in the 1970’s, a lot of cover art is all but forgotten. Today we’re remembering the blacksmith at his labors in 1917. What’s a horse to do these days – go to a shoe store?

Fill ‘er Up by McCauley Conner

Fill &rquot;er Up
McCauley Conner
April 3, 1937

I suppose remembering the days when someone pumped your gas makes you officially old, but it’s another job that’s gone by the wayside. I never thought the reason might be gas station attendants like this one, who got distracted by pretty ladies. This could get costly these days!

Soda Jerk by Norman Rockwell

Soda Jerk
Norman Rockwell
August 22, 1953

Yes, there were perks to being soda jerks – like girls. Norman Rockwell got the idea for this cover by listening to his youngest son talk about his experience behind the soda fountain. And, yes, Peter Rockwell was the model, although he wasn’t all that pleased with the resulting painting. “I’m not that goofy-looking,” he said. Well, dad had to give the guy some “character”. See if you can dream up any other extinct professions.

Classic Covers: How Labor Has Changed The Saturday Evening Post

Swimming Hole by Norman Rockwell

Swimming Hole
Norman Rockwell
August 11, 1945
© SEPS 1945

This is a charming story-in-a-picture of a salesman making a long drive on a hot August day. No air conditioning in the car, of course. He spots a swimming hole, pulls over and goes for it. He carefully lays his glasses on a newspaper and his lit cigar on his shoe, to be picked up when he emerges (Rockwell was all about details). And then shows us a face of pure bliss. “George Zimmer, my model,” reported Norman Rockwell, “was an awful good sport. He stripped and I poured several buckets of water over his head to get the effect.” And you thought modeling was easy!

Drink of Water by Frank X. Leyendecker

Drink of Water
Frank X. Leyendecker
August 22, 1914
© SEPS 1914

We love this cover from August of 1914 by artist Frank X. Leyendecker (brother of Post cover artist J.C.). Frank did sixteen Post covers, and this one is delightful. Delivering papers in August is hot, tiring work, and the kid deserves a cool drink. The fact that his drinking buddy happens to be a horse doesn’t concern him.

Watering Father by Richard Sargent

Watering Father
Richard Sargent
June 4, 1955
© SEPS 1955

We’d all like to see this scene three seconds later, but this is what we have to work with. While Mom is busy planting and watering flowers, Junior is thinking Dad’s pasty white skin needs a cool-down. Whether Dad agreed it was a good idea is a mystery left up to the viewer. Sargent was great with humorous scenes and a master at the pregnant pause, the “what-happens-next” moment.

Wet Swim Suit by Clarence F. Underwood

Wet Swim Suit
Clarence F. Underwood
August 24, 1912
© SEPS 1912

We know, you’re shocked. A pretty young lady in a swimsuit on the cover of the staid and venerable Saturday Evening Post. And in 1912 yet! Well, even young ladies in 1912 deserved a cool-down. At least we don’t have to wring out the heavy skirts of our swimsuits these days. Artist Clarence F. Underwood did over forty Post covers. Even though most of them were in the 19-teens, many showed active women: fishing, playing tennis, canoeing, even plowing a field. Of course, they looked surprisingly pretty doing all this.

Sitting on the Diving Board by Penrhyn Stanlaws

Sitting On the Diving Board
Penrhyn Stanlaws
August 19, 1933
© 1933 SEPS.

My, how bathing suits changed in a mere twenty-one years! In a swimsuit more suited for immersion, the pretty lady from 1933 is just dipping her toes in the water. Go figure. Curtis Publishing (curtispublishing.com) shows many gorgeous Stanlaws covers, usually of lovely young ladies holding a teacup or bouquet. He did a total of thirty-seven Post covers between 1913 and 1938. (Warning: if you look up his covers on the Curtis website, you’ll want to buy prints of them all.)

Cool Bear by Charles Livingston Bull

Cool Bear
Charles Livingston Bull
August 19, 1922
© SEPS 1922

Then there’s the total immersion therapy. This is from Country Gentleman magazine (a sister publication) in 1922 by great wildlife artist, Charles Livingston Bull. If that water looks good to you, a word of advice: Find another place to cool down.

Classic Covers: August Cool-Down The Saturday Evening Post

Read “Talleyrand Penrod” by Booth Tarkington. Originally published in June 21, 1913 [PDF download].

“Talleyrand Penrod” by Booth Tarkington The Saturday Evening Post

On July 30, 1916, saboteurs working for the Imperial German Army blew up a munitions plant on the New Jersey shore, directly across from Liberty Island and Ellis Island. The blast, which was felt throughout New York, had the equivalent force of a 5.0 Richter-scale earthquake. It knocked sleepers out of their beds in Manhattan and rained debris for a two-mile radius. The shock of its force drove shrapnel into Miss Liberty’s gown and weakened the structure of her arm.

Incredibly, German agents caused this damage—estimated at half a billion dollars in 2010 currency—eight months before they were at war with the United States.

According to a 1940 article, the explosion on Black Tom peninsula might have served several purposes for the Central Powers. The author, Emanuel Voska, was a Czech spy living in New York who provided intelligence to the British government. In 1916, as he learned that German agents were tampering with munitions intended for Czarist Russia, which was then fighting for the Allies.

Cases labeled and listed as ammunition, but really containing scrap iron, old lead, or anything else heavy and useless, were being sent to Russia. This was not only sabotage but graft on a large scale. The men back of this were undoubtedly Russians collaborating with Germans. They made the Russian government pay for this junk as ammunition, and pocketed the money.

By the middle of July, thousands of cases of this stuff, together with enormous quantities of genuine ammunition, had piled up in warehouses, barges and freight cars at the Black Tom terminal of the Lehigh Valley Railroad.

This extraordinary accumulation of explosives worried me. It seemed like an invitation to the German dynamiters.

Allied Intelligence was already increasing the number of inspectors munitions factories. According to Voska, he ordered a dozen men specifically to guard the approaches to the Black Tom peninsula. He then informed the head of Russian intelligence in New York about his suspicions. Before any action could be taken, though, the saboteurs struck. Shortly after 2:00 AM, on July 30—

I woke in the small hours of the morning in terror. My stout brick house was shivering, my bed was swaying, the windows were rattling. I jumped up, fully awake, and ran to a window facing south. The distant skyscrapers rose black against a sky that seemed all aflame. My mind jumped to the explanation. The worst had happened! Someone had blown up Black Tom.

The phone rang. The jerky, excited voice of one of my guards on the Jersey shore reported, “Everything is blown up—everything! Black Tom is just one big flame!”…

I took the subway to South Ferry. The port of Manhattan Island, usually deserted at that hour, boiled with activity. Police reserves were pushing back crowds to make way for fire engines. My feet crunched on glass—the explosions seemed to have smashed every window around. Southward, huge geysers of flame showed where burning barges were loose from their moorings. Now and then, a dull explosion would precede the appearance of a gigantic moon in the southern sky. A sickening odor of burning chemicals filled the air.

I crowded onto a ferryboat for New Jersey. By enthusiastic shoving, I managed to land ahead of the others. For a fare amounting to a bribe, I got a taxicab. We made slow progress—all New Jersey seemed to be rushing toward Black Tom. When I posted my guards, I had selected a little all-night beer joint as a rendezvous. I found that although the explosion had smashed all its windows and blown its door off its hinges, the bartender was still doing business.

These live shells were salvaged by workers after most of the vast store of ammunitions at Black Tom had been destroyed in the blast.

Machachek, commander of our patrol on Black Tom, was waiting for me. He gave a quick account.

At a little before one o’clock in the morning a sudden fire broke out in a freight car. Near it were dozens of cars filled with shells and raw explosives. Sensibly and prudently, the watchmen gave an alarm and ran. At eight minutes past one, the barge, tied to a wharf more than a hundred yards from the fire, blew up. It was half an hour later before the fire in the freight car reached the other cars on the tracks, bringing the second explosion.

Only one detail of his story has any special interest after all these years. “The first explosion,” he said, “was on a barge tied up to the pier. A few minutes before the barge went up, I saw a rowboat approaching it. I could make out the figures of two men aboard. After that, everything blazed, bright as day. I saw no boat come away.”

By now, the German agents were not working in one tight organization, but in groups. Jealousy and the secretiveness of men engaged in a trade, which endangered their necks kept them from confiding in one another. Probably, the cause of the fire in the freight car was one of those time bombs, which the Germans had used to burn ships at sea. But the men in the boat? Machachek saw them approach the barge; he did not see them come away. It is possible that the directors of the plot worked a diabolical trick on their own dynamiters. This affair was so dangerous that they wished to take no chances with an operative who might be caught and confess. The man who ordered the job may have handed the perpetrators an apparatus which he described as a time bomb, but which, actually, would go off when it was set.

Ultimately, Germany accepted responsibility for the destruction and paid reparations to the United States. To Voska, though, the responsibility lay elsewhere.

As I went home that night, I kept repeating to myself, “It was the Russians—it was the Russians!” Even after all these years of reflection, I cannot get that thought out of my head.

He was convinced that Black Tom was destroyed by Russian double agents. They had accepted money from the Kaiser’s government to keep munitions from reaching the Russian army. They were also probably working for the Bolshevik forces who hoped a Russian defeat would speed the revolution (which it did). And they were lining their own pockets by selling the same withheld munitions time and again. And, most likely, they were directed by the head of Russian intelligence in New York—the same man Voska had informed of his suspicions.

For more information, you should check out the original Post article, “‘Canadian Invasion’ and Black Tom” [PDF], published in 1940.

Enemy Agents Strike New York—In 1916 The Saturday Evening Post

Toddler Watering Geraniums by K.R. Wireman, June 28, 1924 (The Country Gentleman)

Toddler Watering Geraniums
K. R. Wireman
The Country Gentleman
June 28, 1924

The Country Gentleman magazine (from the same publisher as the Post) showed us that gardeners come in all shapes and sizes. Cutie Patootie here wants to help with watering the flowers. This is from 1924. Artist K.R. Wireman is little known today but did about two dozen covers for The Country Gentleman magazine and about a half dozen for the Post.

Hardware Store at Springtime by Stevan Dohanos, March 16, 1946

Hardware Store at Springtime
Stevan Dohanos
March 16, 1946

This is the part I love best! Shopping for flowers at the local stores. This hardware store in 1946 is tempting your wallet with shiny equipment, seeds, and cool stuff for your patio. “There is nothing like the feel of a good rake or hoe in your hand,” the editors noted, “in the hardware store.”

Ready to Garden by J.C. Leyendecker, May 6, 1916

Ready to Garden
J. C. Leyendecker
May 6, 1916

All ready with his brand-spanking-new equipment and the latest seed catalog is this endearing fellow by artist J.C. Leyendecker. Oh, to have a shiny new push mower like this one from 1916! Oh wait, we can still get one. It’s just that it will be $100-$200 these days.

Geranium Gardener by W.D. Stevens, May 1, 1937

Geranium Gardener
W. D. Stevens
May 1, 1937

I wish artist W.D. Stevens had done more than one cover for the Post, because this is a charmer. Dig the high-tech wheelbarrow. That, a couple of rakes, a shovel, a hoe, and a watering can for one itty-bitty geranium. And darned if she doesn’t look good doing it!

Little Girl Gardener by K.R. Wireman, March 15, 1919 (The Country Gentleman)

Little Girl Gardener
K. R. Wireman
The Country Gentleman Magazine
March 15, 1919

Now THIS is a gardener! If you can grow cabbages half your size and body weight, you have accomplished something indeed. This is another adorable cover from artist K.R. Wireman and is from 1919.

Victory Garden by Howard Scott, August 7, 1943

Victory Garden
Howard Scott
August 7, 1943

Now for the part about gardening we all like least. Toiling in his victory garden in 1943, the man’s face and posture says it all. Maybe a wifely backrub and some fresh-cooked veggies will make it all worthwhile.

Classic Covers: Calling All Gardeners The Saturday Evening Post

In 1935, The Saturday Evening Post was offering a Shirley Temple doll to anyone who would send in a certain number of new subscriptions for the magazine. “I really wanted that doll,” Maxine writes. “I lived in Seattle and I can remember trudging around in the rain knocking on neighbors’ doors, trying to get new subscriptions. Finally, I succeeded and sent in the required new subscriptions. To my delight, I received the ‘authentic Shirley Temple doll’ as promised.”

Lester Bishop(rear, right) poses with his fellow Post Boys in 1910.
Courtesy of George Crotts.

We’re happy to share the photo of Maxine today, prettier than ever, with that same beloved Shirley Temple doll. Thank you for sharing your story, Maxine. We’ll put a bug in the Editor’s ear about this method of increasing circulation.

But we have an even older photo to share, sent in by George Crotts, Jr. of North Bend, Washington. This is a remarkably good photo for 1910 and shows Lester Bishop, a cousin to George’s mother, standing in the rear to your right. Young Lester, born in 1899, had an early and sad ending, we’re sorry to say. A mere eight years after this newsboy photo, Lester died from wounds received at the battle of Chateau-Thierry, France in World War I.

George included some photos of Les with family and friends before shipping out to France. Included was this one of Les and his parents in a fancy automobile. “Lester was honored,” George writes, “along with another young man as being the first two killed in action from Sutter-Yuba Counties in California” when VFW Post 948 in Marysville was named for them.

Les Bishop with his parents just before his deployment in World War I.
Courtesy of George Crotts.

Too many wars, too many young lives taken too soon. We’re proud to publish these fine photos in Lester Bishop’s memory.

If you have a Post Newsboy (or girl) story, the Post would love to hear from you. Send stories and photos to Diana at d.denny@satevepost.org.

Post Boys and Girls – 74 Years Later The Saturday Evening Post

N. C. Wyeth

Cowboy in Setting Sun
November 30, 1997
N. C. Wyeth

The father of painter Andrew Wyeth and grandfather of present-day artist Jamie Wyeth, Newell Convers Wyeth was a student of Howard Pyle and the Brandywine School of art. Wyeth’s first professional work was a commissioned illustration for the Post. His sense of color and mood was particularly suited to Western subjects, which also appealed to Lorimer. So the Post sent Wyeth to gain firsthand knowledge of his subject. On trips to the western United States, he worked as a ranch hand in Colorado and rode mail routes in New Mexico and Arizona.

Charles Livingston Bull

Fox and Goose
Charles Livingston Bull
September 9, 1905

Known chiefly as an animal illustrator, Bull literally drew from his experience as a taxidermist at the National Museum in Washington, D.C. Bull’s images, whether an eagle soaring in flight or a fox on the prowl, gave a majestic, even startling, life and grace to his wild subjects.

Angus MacDonall

St. Bernard for SaleAngus MacDonall
October 8, 1921

MacDonall, who came from the Midwest but eventually migrated east to become part of the Westport, Connecticut art colony, did only a few covers for the Post, but they were memorable, especially his poignant depictions of children. The forlorn boy and his dog were real, seen by a reader in Oregon, who described the scene vividly in a letter to the editor.

Ellen Pyle

Ice Cream Cone
Ellen Pyle
August 12, 1922

Like N.C. Wyeth, Ellen Bernard Thompson Pyle was a student of Howard Pyle’s Brandywine School, later marrying Howard’s brother Walter. When they started a family, Pyle set painting aside, but after Walter’s death in 1919, as a widow with four children, Pyle resumed her career to make ends meet. She struggled at first, but then her sister-in-law took three of Pyle’s paintings to the Post—and Lorimer promptly bought two of them, in addition to the girl with the ice cream cone, which became a cover in 1922 (after Lorimer insisted that the dog, originally shown drooling, be retouched). Pyle painted 40 Post covers in all, often using her children as models. The girls sipping sodas here are Pyle’s daughters.

J. C. Leyendecker

Carnival
J. C. Leyendecker
February 25, 1933

Joseph Christian Leyendecker received his first commission to paint a Post cover the same year George Horace Lorimer began running them, in 1899. Before Norman Rockwell arrived, no other artist had been so closely identified with the Post. Leyendecker famously created the iconic New Year’s Baby and the pudgy red-garbed rendition of Santa Claus, among other enduring images. Rockwell himself idolized the artist, calling him “a superb draftsman and a fine colorist,” as evidenced here. Leyendecker had an eye for the humor in everyday life, too (as in the case of the ample bathing beauty and her water wings, witnessed by a Post editor, who later described her to Leyendecker), which always delighted readers.

For more cover art, visit saturdayeveningpostcovers.com.

The Art of the Post The Saturday Evening Post