ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
WHEN I LEFT NEWSWEEK in 1991 after twenty-five years, I took home the documents surrounding our 1970 lawsuit. By then, no one seemed interested. I was going to send them to the women’s archives at Radcliffe’s Schlesinger Library, which had requested the material, but I got sidetracked. In 2006, when I finally had time, I realized that to make sense of the papers I had to write a narrative. I started contacting the women involved. When the history grew to 30,000 words, I knew this was a story that should be told.
Interviewing people about what happened forty years ago, however, was a challenge. My own memory proved inaccurate in several instances and other people’s recollections contradicted one another. I have tried my best to reconstruct what happened using documents, interviews, and research. However people remember it, I am hoping that, as T.S. Eliot said, “the end of all of our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.”
I interviewed over forty people who were at Newsweek at the time, including, just before he died, Oz Elliott. All of them contributed facets of the story and I deeply appreciate their help. But this tale could not have been told without the testimony and insight of Judy Gingold, Lucy Howard, Peter Goldman, Pat Lynden, Margaret Montagno, Trish Reilly, Mary Pleshette Willis, Harry Waters, Mariana Gosnell, Franny Heller Zorn, Betsy Carter, Phyllis Malamud, and Elisabeth Coleman. I am indebted to them for their time and their support. I also want to thank our two inspiring lawyers, Eleanor Holmes Norton in the first lawsuit, and Harriet Rabb, whose files on the second lawsuit were invaluable.
In capturing what Newsweek was like in the early sixties, I relied on the vivid memories of Jane Bryant Quinn, Ellen Goodman, and Nora Ephron. Gloria Steinem, Betsy Wade, Anna Quindlen, and Gail Collins provided essential information on the tenor of the times.
When I started reporting, I didn’t know Jessica Bennett, Jesse Ellison, and Sarah Ball, three young women working at Newsweek. I am so grateful to them for keeping our story alive. I am also proud that they now call themselves feminists and are passionately carrying on the fight for women’s rights. At Newsweek/Daily Beast, Sam Register, director of the library, and photo editor Beth Johnson were especially helpful.
I want to thank my friend Peter Osnos, founder of Public Affairs, who was an early supporter of the project, and PublicAffairs’ publisher, Susan Weinberg, and senior editor and marketing director, Lisa Kaufman, who were enthusiastic about the book from the very beginning. I am particularly indebted to Lisa, my editor, for her sage advice and suggestions in helping me shape the story. Managing editor Melissa Raymond kept me on track, and assistant director of publicity Tessa Shanks provided creative and expert guidance. My lawyer, Jan Constantine, general counsel at the Authors Guild, shepherded me through the contract and made smart recommendations.
Throughout this project, I was encouraged by many close friends. I am especially grateful to Jack Willis, Sarah Duffy Edwards, Rosemary Ellis, Polly McCall, and Letty Cottin Pogrebin who urged me to keep going whenever I got stuck.
I could not have written this book without the loving support of my husband, Steve Shepard, a brilliant editor who makes everything in my life better. As I was laboring with my book, Steve began to write a memoir of his life in journalism, from Newsweek and BusinessWeek to the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism. It’s called Deadlines and Disruption: My Turbulent Path from Print to Digital. As luck would have it, our books are being published in the same month.
Our children, Sarah and Ned, bring joy and meaning to my life every day. May this story inspire them to speak up and make a difference.