E-Book Overview
Friends, collaborators, and childhood rivals, Briton Hadden and Henry R. Luce were not yet twenty-five when they started Time, the first newsmagazine, at the outset of the Roaring Twenties. By age thirty, they were both millionaires, having laid the foundation for a media empire. But their partnership was explosive and their competition ferocious, fueled by envy as well as love. When Hadden died at the age of thirty-one, Luce began to meticulously bury the legacy of the giant he was never able to best. In this groundbreaking, stylish, and passionate biography, Isaiah Wilner paints a fascinating portrait of Briton Hadden—genius and visionary—and presents the first full account of the birth of Time, while offering a provocative reappraisal of Henry R. Luce, arguably the most significant media figure of the twentieth century. Isaiah Wilner is a writer for New York magazine. He attended Yale University and was editor in chief of the Yale Daily News. He lives in Brooklyn, New York.
E-Book Content
The Man Time Forgot A Tale of Genius, Betrayal, and the Creation of Time Magazine
isaiah wilner
For Jeff and Lucy
CONTENTS
prologue: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16.
epilogue:
Death Wish Birth The Hill Most Likely to Succeed Destiny Time Will Tell Long Shot Ballgames Timestyle Burning Both Ends Hammer and Tongs Hot Stuff Man of the Year Geniuses Oliver Twisting The Final Fight Burial
1 9 25 40 62 76 96 114 126 144 158 176 191 201 213 225 236
Photographic Insert
243
The Party of All Time
255
iv
contents Acknowledgments A Note on Sources Author’s Interviews Abbreviations Source Notes Bibliography Index
About the Author Credits Cover Copyright About the Publisher
261 269 273 275 277 319 331
PROLOGUE
De a th Wish
In January of 1929, the creator of Time magazine lay dying in a Brooklyn hospital bed. He was thirty years old. Briton Hadden did not look like a man with only a few weeks to live. His family had decided not to tell him of his dire condition. But the doctors believed he stood almost no chance. Hadden, who had only just begun the creative revolution that would transform journalism in the subsequent century, had drunk and partied his way to his deathbed. In the giddy and rebellious decade just ending, a time when youth shattered old rules of behavior, a time that saw the emergence of jazz, modern literature, and transcontinental flight, Hadden had influenced popular culture in ways that would permeate the American mindset, changing the way people thought and acted in the twentieth century. By the age of twenty-five, he had created the first magazine to make sense of the news for a broad national audience. By the age of twenty-seven, he had invented a writing style that brought great events to life, informing a wide group of Americans. By the age of thirty, he had made his first million dollars. “Anyone over thirty is ready for the grave,” Hadden had proclaimed during the heady years of his quick rise to influence. A muscular man with a barrel chest and a square jaw, he looked more like an athlete than an editor. But there were signs of eccentric genius in his intense face: the gray-green eyes that twinkled when he laughed, the
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the man time forgot
pencil-thin mustache that drew attention to a mischievous smile. He had lived fast all the way, dancing to “Hindustan” at the Plaza, hosting outrageous cocktail hours that mixed ministers with call girls, shocking friends by showing up for parties in an asbestos suit and stamping out cigarettes on the arm of his jacket. In a hurry to achieve all he had dreamed, Hadden had rushed about with his coat collar up, chewing gum, chain-smoking, and swinging his cane. When he talked, he often barke