THIS BOOK IS AN EXHUMATION of 50 years’ worth of decisions, ambitions, interpretations, and inventions by a series of superb magazine-makers facing relentless time pressure, occasional financial anxiety, and the exhilarating confusion of a constantly changing city. The editorial staff members of New York since 1968 effectively created these pages, and we owe an enormous debt of gratitude to all of them, past and present, and to all the previous editors-in-chief: Clay Felker, James Brady, Joseph Gravitt Armstrong, Edward Kosner, Kurt Andersen, and Caroline Miller. The lush and thrilling look of New York that Milton Glaser and Walter Bernard invented many years ago has been evolving under the guidance of subsequent designers and photography editors—all of whom have their fingerprints all over these pages.
In particular, we appreciate the many editors, writers, photographers, and graphic designers who contributed their time to the making of this book. In addition to the editors-in-chief and those credited on the last page, we would like to thank the following:
Sam Anderson, Julie Baumgold, David Blum, James Brady, Marie Brenner, Jimmy Breslin, David Brock, Jonathan Chait, Nik Cohn, Justin Davidson, David Denby, Edwin Diamond, David Edelstein, Nora Ephron, Steve Fishman, Barbara Goldsmith, Richard Goldstein, Jennifer Gonnerman, Meryl Gordon, Herb Goro, Jesse Green, Gael Greene, Mark Greif, Vanessa Grigoriadis, Michael Gross, John Hallowell, Pete Hamill, Molly Haskell, John Heilemann, Craig Horowitz, Doug Ireland, Mark Jacobson, Bernice Kanner, Joe Klein, Jesse Kornbluth, Michael Kramer, Dan Lee, Spike Lee, John Leonard, Elizabeth Lesly, Mary Ann Madden, Jonathan Mahler, Norman Mailer, Rebecca Mead, Lisa Miller, Emily Nussbaum, Nicholas Pileggi, Henry Post, Jessica Pressler, Frank Rich, Jennifer Rogers, Nancy Jo Sales, Jerry Saltz, Doria Santlofer, Kathryn Schulz, Jennifer Senior, Irwin Shaw, Gail Sheehy, Mimi Sheraton, Gabriel Sherman, Choire Sicha, John Simon, Chris Smith, Gloria Steinem, Peter Stone, Andrew Sullivan, Judy (Syfers) Brady, Gay Talese, Michael Tomasky, Rebecca Traister, Richard Turner, Jonathan Van Meter, Michael VerMeulen, Judith Viorst, Amy Virshup, Benjamin Wallace, Kat Ward, Tom Wolfe, and Wesley Yang wrote the memorable stories that fill these pages.
John Ashbery, John Berendt, Stella Bugbee, Nicholas Gage, Deborah Harkins, Luke Hayman, Michael Hirschorn, John Homans, Noreen Malone, Kelly Maloni, Adam Pasick, Willa Paskin, Alan Patricof, Rob Patronite, Corky Pollan, Robin Raisfeld, Richard Reeves, Jordan Schaps, RitaSue Siegel, Stephen Sondheim, Viva, Jean-Georges Vongerichten, Ben Williams, Anna Wintour, and Michael Wolff also spoke graciously and candidly with Christopher Bonanos to help shape our oral history and captions.
Editors Ann Clarke, Wendy Goodman, Jared Hohlt, Lauren Kern, Amy Larocca, Genevieve Smith, Alexis Swerdloff, and David Wallace-Wells all provided wise and helpful counsel.
Carl Swanson and Adam Sternbergh captained the assembly of our 408-item “Approval Matrix.”
Alexa Tsoulis-Reay, Alan Sytsma, and Eric Benson contributed reporting and research.
Cathy Allis created our 50th-anniversary crossword puzzle.
Charles Denson graciously shared his archive of photographs from the early years of the magazine.
Staff photographer Bobby Doherty’s images appear throughout the pages of this book.
Joy Crane, Morgan Kinney, Jordan Larson, Julia Mead, Amelia Schonbek, Nick Tabor, and James D. Walsh provided expert fact-checking; Mary Jane Weedman lent her expert eyes to copy-editing.
Thanks to Lisa Abreu, Larry Burstein, Brian Carney, Lisa Goren, Mona Houck (of Miller Korzenick Sommers LLP), Julie Jamerson, Abby Kallgren, Ruth Monsanto, Adelina Pepenella, Steve Remsberg, Lauren Starke, and Kit Taylor at New York for their support throughout this project.
Special thanks to David Kuhn, who, along with William LoTurco and their colleagues at Aevitas Creative Management helped conceive this project and convince us magazine editors that we could also make books. David introduced us to Jonathan Karp, who has demonstrated such warm enthusiasm for this project—the beginning of what we expect will be a terrific relationship between New York and Simon & Schuster. We extend our gratitude to our many friends at Simon & Schuster, including Stephen Bedford, Susan Bishansky, Raymond Chokov, Paul Dippolito, Lisa Erwin, Jonathan Evans, Erica Ferguson, Elizabeth Gay, Cary Goldstein, Julianna Haubner, Kayley Hoffman, Al Imperato, Kristen Lemire, Amanda Mulholland, Julia Prosser, Richard Rhorer, Emily Remes, Elisa Rivlin, Jackie Seow, and Alex Su. And in particular, we are grateful for the wisdom and imagination of Jofie Ferrari-Adler, who carried this extremely complex project to its finish.
And finally, thank you to Bruce Wasserstein, who bought the magazine in 2004; Pam Wasserstein, who runs it now; and their family, whose stewardship of New York would have made Clay Felker proud.