The week in magazines

Town magazine ran a cover and several pages of the Monroe photos by  George Barris in 1963

It’s been a interesting week for magazines. There was the death of George Barris, the US photojournalist whose pictures of  Marilyn Monroe in her final weeks were published in Town magazine in the 1960s. A decade later, the Sunday Times Magazine made a cover of the ‘last pictures’; and again after that. And again in 2005.

Then there was the mega spat at the venerable Burlington magazine, which saw the editor resign, along with her deputy, after just a year in the chair following a staff rebellion against her changes.

Over at Teddington, the Heseltine’s family plaything Haymarket sold Autosport, F1 Racing and Autosport News, along with the rest of its motorsport division to US group Motorsport Network. Not a big deal, but another example of the hollowing-out of British magazine publishing.

Farther north, in Scotland in fact, today’s Sunday Mail reminds us of the power of magazines to hold up newspapers. The paper is offering readers a free copy of The Scots Magazine – ‘the world’s best-selling Scottish-interest publication, covering topics from the contemporary to the historical’. It’s a similar story in Ireland, with the Irish Mail on Sunday spearheading a revamp with a new supplement:

JUST LOOK WHAT YOU GET! Today we are adding our new Irish Mail on Sunday MAGAZINE to the package of delights you pick up with your favourite newspaper. Already Ireland’s best-value Sunday newspaper, from today it’s getting even better AND bigger with the MAGAZINE, our superb new bumper celebrity, culture, home & garden magazine.
Every week, we’ll have an in-depth look at – and interviews with – the celebrities from at home and abroad… including the new SHRINK WRAP, where we get inside the head of a well known personality every week. Today, take your pick from Sarah Jessica Parker, new RTÉ star Seána Kerslake from Can’t Cope, Won’t Cope and international singing sensation Sophie Ellis Bextor.
Ireland’s top columnist, FIONA LOONEY’s weekly take on the world… from her kitchen sink!

And ancient jokes from Punch kick off the final episode in ITV’s costume drama series Victoria this evening. Prince Albert (Tom Hughes) reads aloud two jokes to the queen, the second of which is: ‘Who is the greatest chicken-killer in Shakespeare’s plays? Macbeth, because he did murder most foul.’ To which Victoria (played by Dr Who’s former sidekick, Jenna Coleman) replies: ‘We are not amused.’ This follows the trend in ITV’s Downton, which was forever mentioning The Lady in connection with advertising for domestic staff.

Gym Class, the magazine about  magazines, last issue

Finally, the latest – and last! – issue of Gym Class, the magazine about magazines, is out. I have to confess an interest here, having written the pieces about the rules of cover design (on the cover) and a visual about the price of vintage magazines.

£3300 on eBay for the first Monroe magazine cover

Leader magazine led the world in putting Marilyn Monroe on its cover in April 1946

Can you believe it? A threepenny weekly magazine from 13 April 1946 sells on eBay for $5,100.99 – that’s£3,302 – after 45 bids. Gobsmacking, but it’s true. And the reason? It’s the first magazine to show Norma Jeane Mortenson, also known as Norma Jeane and later pin-up model and Hollywood star Marilyn Monroe, on its cover.

That’s four years before her first decent film role in All About Eve and seven years before the Playboy first issue cover.

According to the listing, this is the ‘first solo cover in the world’ of Norma Jeane, with the British weekly predating the April 26 issue of Family Circle in the USA picturing Norma Jeane holding a baby lamb on the cover:

This issue of Leader is a complete 28 page double-staple bound style pulp magazine in very good condition. Cover photo is the same Andre de Dienes ‘M.M.’ photograph which appeared a second time in France only a few months later on the cover of the September 3 1946 issue of Votre Amie (‘Your Friend’). The Leader cover photo was published in black and white, while the negative was flipped and photo colorised for its appearance on the cover of Votre Amie.

The same seller also sold a copy of that Votre Amie cover for £900 on eBay.

Leader was at this time published by Hulton Press, whose other magazines included Lilliput, Picture Post and the Eagle.

>>Leader magazine history

 

Marilyn Monroe magazines from 1953 on eBay

Picture Post from 1953 with Marilyn Monroe and Jane Russell on the cover from Gentlemen Prefer Blondes

Among the 815,281 magazines presently listed on eBay in the UK are two classic illustrated weeklies with Marilyn Monroe covers. The first is Picture Post from 1953 with Marilyn Monroe and Jane Russell on the cover from the film Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.

Illustrated magazine from 1953 with Marilyn Monroe, Lauren Bacall and Betty Grable on the cover, from the film How to Marry a Millionaire

Second is Illustrated magazine from 1953 with Marilyn Monroe, Lauren Bacall and Betty Grable on the cover, from the film How to Marry a Millionaire.

Both these weekly magazines are priced at £29.99 from the Advertising Archives as buy-it-now or best offer lots.

To see almost 500 magazine covers and pages, look out my book, A History of British Magazine Design, from the Victoria & Albert Museum, the world’s leading museum of art and design

Emma Peel wins the day over Marilyn Monroe

Diana Rigg as The Avengers’ Mrs Peel on the cover of TV World in 1965

Who is the most popular cover star? Joan Collins, Marilyn Monroe? To judge by two recent eBay sales, it’s actually the 27-year-old Diana Rigg – as Emma Peel in The Avengers.

Marilyn Monroe on the cover of Blighty from 1956

The evidence is the £147 that a 1965 copy of TV World fetched. There were no less than 18 bids from 4 people. In contrast, a 1956 Blighty with Monroe on the cover brought in a mere £46 (12 bids from 4 people). A copy of the same issue of Blighty fetched £70 on eBay in April.

When it comes to collecting magazines and TV memorabilia though, Mrs Peel and Steed have a long way to go to catch up with Dr Who and the Daleks – a copy of the first Radio Times cover for Dr Who has fetched £509.99.

Emma Peel in one of her leather jumpsuits in a spread from TV World

TV World listed Midlands ITV programmes and this issue covered Saturday December 25 to Friday December 3. Inside there was a double page interview with Rigg – who had found that ‘sudddenly, everybody wants to marry me’ since she featured in the spy series. The seller, Brogan2040, specialises in film and TV.

Other articles covered Noel Gordon and Anthony Morton in Crossroads, a Stars Snakes and Ladders game and an interview with Mark Goddard of Lost in Space. The listings include episodes from The Avengers, Gerry Anderson’s Stingray and Patrick McGoohan as Danger Man.

Nick Buckler, the Blighty seller, also has a July 1957 copy of Fiesta on ebay with a Monroe cover and centre spread.

Monroe brings glamour to Blighty price on eBay

1956 copy of Blighty with Marilyn Monroe cover

A Marilyn Monroe cover sprinkled some stardust on the price of this 1956 copy of Blighty when it was sold on eBay recently.

Copies of Blighty – which was originally a free magazine for the troops in the First World War and then resurrected for WWII – are usually more likely to fetch £5 than £50, but this issue fetched a whacking £70.88 plus £1.40 postage on eBay. And, there were 31 bids from 6 bidders.

After World War Two, Blighty carried on being published, turning itself into ‘the national humorous weekly’ and then a popular men’s weekly. It later renamed itself Parade and became more explicit, ending up on the top shelf.

A rare colour cover by Arthur Ferrier to help Blighty magazine celebrate VE Day in 1945

The covers were at first whole-page cartoons by the prolific Arthur Ferrier, but mono photographs of young starlets such as Joan Collins or Sabrina replaced these at the end of 1953 and then colour became a regular feature during 1954. Ferrier’s cartoons moved to page 3. One Ferrier cover for Blighty that did well on eBay marked the end of WWII and fetched £48.99 plus £3.99 postage (13 bids by 4 bidders). This was unusual for the time in being colour.

Here is a 1944 British Pathe film of Ferrier drawing a strip for his Sally cartoon in the News of the World based a live model, theatre actress Eileen Bennett.

A contemporary Marilyn Monroe cover will lift the price of most magazines, she being sought after by film and celebrity enthusiasts, and she is an icon for the gay community – an aspect encouraged by Elton John’s ‘Candle in the Wind’.