Tag Archives: Shadowland

The Top 10 Magazine Covers of Winter 1923

It’s been a while since I’ve done a magazine cover post, and last time I was kind of snarky, so I decided to set out in search of the top 10 magazine covers of January and February 1923.

Except that it was really hot outside (I’m in Cape Town), and I wasn’t feeling all that energetic, so I thought maybe ChatGPT could find them for me.

In other words, do your own blog post, I’m too busy writing term papers!

Feeling slightly chastened, I set out on my search.

I started out with a round of disqualifications, beginning with covers that reused illustrations that had originally appeared elsewhere. This led me down a rabbit hole of trying to figure out whether the Jessie Willcox Smith illustration from Little Women that appears on the cover of the February 1923 issue of Good Housekeeping is from the edition of the book that she illustrated. I tentatively decided that it isn’t.

I had an even harder time figuring out the provenance of Smith’s January 1923 cover featuring Hans Brinker. Irritated, I summarily disqualified Smith. I was looking for edgier covers in any case.

Next to go was the February Ladies’ Home Journal cover, which turned out to be a painting by French artist Gabriel Émile Edouard Nicolet, who died in 1921.

Then I eliminated covers that gave me the creeps, regardless of their artistic merit.

Ditto, covers with guns,

especially covers with babies with guns.

Next up are the covers that captured my interest for reasons other than the quality of the art, like this one from Fruit, Garden and Home, which, fascinatingly, turns out to be the original name of Better Homes and Gardens, from its founding in 1922 until August 1924, when sanity prevailed and the magazine was renamed.

And this one from Popular Mechanics, illustrating an article called “Down Popocatepetl on a Straw Mat.” As someone who rode up Popocatepetl (a volcano outside Mexico City) in a car and struggled to walk up a tiny bit of it, I have a great deal of admiration for anyone who accomplished this.*

And this intriguing cover illustrating the article “Stopped by a Pencil” in Personal Efficiency magazine. What the heck is going on here? A metaphor for bureaucracy? An actual giant pencil on the rampage? Sadly, Personal Efficiency is not available online, so I’ll never know.

And now for the Top 10! Ranking them was a challenge, not for the usual “it was so hard to decide, everyone deserved to win” reason but because of the lack of standouts. Most of the covers struck me as deserving to be ranked #5. Here’s what I came up with, after a lot of hemming and hawing.

10. Popular Science, January 1923, artist unknown

I toyed with the idea of relegating this cover to the same category as the giant pencil, but it’s just too cool. I mean, it’s a monster new airship that will carry passengers across the continent! Called the San Francisco Express! Okay, it might be a dubious bit of futurology at a time when transatlantic airplane flights had already taken place,** but still…cool!

9. Shadowland, February 1923, A. M. Hopfmuller.

I can never figure out what exactly is going on in A.M. Hopfmuller’s Shadowland covers, but I’ll miss them when the magazine ceases publication in November 1923.

8. Vanity Fair, February 1923, Anne Harriet Fish

I’m a fan of Fish’s Vanity Fair covers, and this one might have ranked more highly if I could figure what exactly was going on. A woman is looking through store receipts??? and is crying??? or holding another receipt up to her face??? while her husband smokes nonchalantly??? Or something??? Plus, what’s the deal with that chair?

7. Vogue, George Wolfe Plank, February 1, 1923

This cover, of a woman feeding a sugar cube to a dragon, is done with Plank’s usual artistry, but it just didn’t particularly grab me the way some of his other covers did.***

6. Saturday Evening Post, Coles Phillips, February 17, 1923

My love for Coles Phillips knows no bounds, and I’m always happy to see him pop up, but the Saturday Evening Post’s limited color palate doesn’t play to his strengths.

5. McCall’s, January 1923, Neysa McMein

I’m normally more of a fan of Neysa McMein as a fascinating 1920s figure (salon hostess, suffragist, Dorothy Parker’s best friend, etc.) than as an artist, but there’s something that haunts me about this woman. “Who are you?” I keep asking myself. “And what’s wrong?”

4. The Crisis, February 1923, Louis Portlock

I’m not familiar with Louis Portlock and I couldn’t find out anything about him except for one other cover for The Crisis, from 1922. I like the simplicity of this illustration.

3. Harper’s Bazar, January 1923, Erté.

Erté’s never not brilliant, but, as with Plank, I wouldn’t say he was at his best here.****

2. Motor, January 1923, Howard Chandler Christy

I was struck by this Motor cover, although I can’t figure out what’s going on in the lower left corner, where the woman’s dress seems to turn into a wall, or something. I didn’t think I was familiar with Christy, but it turns out that he was the artist behind some of the most famous World War I recruiting posters, like this one:

1. The Liberator, January 1923, Frank Walts

I almost disqualified this Liberator cover because I featured it with other New Year’s covers in last month’s top posts of 1922 post, but that just seemed unfair, especially given the lack of top-quality covers.***** It wasn’t a shoo-in for #1, but I like the simple artistry.

Even though I wasn’t wowed by this batch of covers, I had fun seeing what some of my favorite artists were up to, discovering a few new ones, and pondering the mystery of the giant pencil. In retrospect, I’m glad ChatGPT wasn’t up to the task.

*Although I have more admiration for the Mexican guy steering with the stick than for the the guy holding on for dear life in the back, who I assume is the writer of the article.

**If, like me until recently, you thought Charles Lindbergh was the first person to fly across the Atlantic, he was just the first person to do it SOLO. British aviators John Alcock and Arthur Brown made the first transatlantic flight in 1919.

***Like this one

George Wolfe Plank, Vogue, June 15, 1921

and this one,

for example.

****As opposed to here

Erté Harper's Bazar cover, February 1918, masked woman looking out window at man. — Erté, February 1918

and here.

*****J.C. Leyendecker’s Saturday Evening Post cover was disqualified, though, because it came out on December 30. Besides, it was confusing.

Summer 1921 Magazine Covers, Viewed Longingly from Wintery Cape Town

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Objectively speaking, winter in Cape Town is not all that bad. The temperature rarely dips below the high 40s, and a cold day is one when it doesn’t make it into the 60s. Subjectively speaking, though, winter in Cape Town is miserable. It rains a lot, and houses don’t have central heating, so we sit around freezing and grumbling.*

What I needed to improve my mood, I decided, was some summer fun from the covers of 1921 magazines. I could pretend I was somewhere hot, hanging around at the beach**

J.C. Leyendecker Saturday Evening Post cover, July 2, 1921, toddler with bucket. — J.C. Leyendecker

or the pool

or fishing

or playing golf

or camping

or basking in the moonlight

or canoodling

or cavorting about in the altogether,

or just hanging around,

maybe at the summer house.

Margaret Harper August 1921 House & Garden cover, country house aerial view. — Margaret Harper

Henry George Brandt June 1021 House & Garden cover, window of cottage with flowers. — Henry George Brandt

(Okay, these are not all ACTUAL wishes. I’m not much of a fisherman, for example.)

Lo and behold, I did actually make it to the northern hemisphere in time for the last few weeks of the summer. It turns out, though, that my image of Washington in August was a teeny bit romanticized. Life has been more like this

and this

than this.

But I’ve had a great time hanging out with my friends,

and even though I haven’t spent much (okay, any) time working on my manuscript

I swear that’s going to happen before the fall sets in.

But fall is weeks away, so let’s not think about it right now. After all, in the words of the #1 hit song of late summer 1921, “In the meantime, in between time…”

*Of course, I always keep in mind how fortunate I am compared to most people in Cape Town.

**If we were rerunning the Best Magazine Cover of a Woman Swimming with a Red Scarf on Her Head competition, we’d have some good contenders here.

New On The Book List:

The Mysterious Affair at Styles, by Agatha Christie

1920 magazine covers bring late winter cheer

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When I picked up my mail after arriving in D.C. from Cape Town a couple of weeks ago, I found to my surprise that I have been a New Yorker subscriber since September. My first reaction: “Oh, look, a giant pile of guilt!” Then I saw the brightly colored covers, and I wanted to gather them all in a slippery embrace, like fellow survivors from a lost world. Few things from 100 years ago bring me as much joy as magazine covers, and few things (well, few non-news-related things) are as dispiriting as a 2020 magazine rack.

I had a post on February 1920 covers almost ready before I left Cape Town, but what with all the electricity cuts I didn’t manage to post it. So I’m covering both February and March here.

The February magazines feature lots of women engaging in wholesome outdoor activities like skiing,

Country Life magazine cover, February 1920, woman skiing.

Edwin Wilson

snowshoeing,

and pathetic ice skating.

Norman Rockwell

And also engaging in unwholesome outdoor activities like this:

Warren Davis

The artist for this surprisingly risqué cover is Warren Davis. He also drew this February 1918 Vanity Fair cover,

which I took note of back in February 2018. That one was also daring, but it struck me as having that Greek mythology vibe that lets you get away with anything. It turns out, though, that young women cavorting around outdoors naked, or at most with a diaphanous scarf, comprise pretty much Warren Davis’ entire oeuvre.*

Some favorite artists are back: Frank Walts at The Crisis,

Frank Walts

Helen Dryden at Vogue,

Helen Dryden

A.M. Hopfmuller at Shadowland,

A.M. Hopfmuller

and, as always, Erté at Harper’s Bazar.

Erté

There’s a Valentine’s theme at Red Cross

Red Cross magazine cover, February 1920, dog carrying Valentines.

(Google/HathiTrust)

and at Smart Set, which I’m pleased to see breaking out of its face-of-young-attractive-woman rut.

There are people in traditional dress at Sunset

and Liberator

Hugo Gellert

and World Outlook.

I loved these covers from House & Garden

Charles Livingston Bull

and Popular Mechanics

and Elite Styles.

As I prepared for my trip, I was all psyched up to leave the southern hemisphere summer for some outdoor winter fun. Of course, what I actually ended up doing was lugging groceries home in the rain. So good riddance to February…

…and onward to blustery March!

St. Nicholas cover, March 1920, young man and women in wind.

(Google/HathiTrust)

They’re getting in some late-season ice skating at Red Cross**

Norman Rockwell

and some early-season boating at Motor Boating.

Am I reading this wrong or is this elephant being used as an accessory to kill other elephants?*** And don’t get me started on the African man in the loincloth.

Everybody’s is late to the Valentine’s Day party.

Vogue has a cover by regular George Wolfe Plank

George Wolfe Plank

and one by 26-year-old newcomer Harriet Meserole, who would go on to be a Vogue stalwart.****

Harriet Meserole

Bright spring colors abound at Harper’s Bazar

Erte Harper's Bazar cover, March 1920, Erte.

Erté

and The Delineator

and The Green Book

and House & Garden

Harry Richardson

and Shadowland

A.M. Hopfmuller

and Vanity Fair, which features a cover by Anne Harriet Fish, an artist whom I wasn’t familiar with but who will now join Gordon Conway and John Held Jr. in the ranks of VF artists whose work I can’t tell apart.

Anne Harriet Fish

Future New Yorker cartoonist Rea Irvin was the artist for this striking, though problematic to modern sensibilities, Life cover.

Rea Irvin

This woman on the cover of the Saturday Evening Post seems to be about to ditzily cast her first vote for the supposedly more handsome candidate, which I would take offense at, except, um, Warren Harding.*****

Neysa McMein

The woodcut on the cover of Liberator is by J.J. Lankes, who was a friend of, and illustrator for, Robert Frost and Sherwood Anderson.

J.J. Lankes

This Photoplay cover isn’t particularly notable except that “If Christ Went to the Movies” is the best cover headline ever.******

Rolf Armstrong

And it wouldn’t be March without a lion and a lamb, courtesy of Carton Moore-Park:*******

Carton Moore-Park

Counting the days until spring!

*Google him if you don’t want to take my word for it. Just don’t do it at the office.

**According to the go-to site for Norman Rockwell cover information, this was Rockwell’s fourth and last cover for Red Cross, which folded in late 1920. Rockwell turned to smaller magazines when large-circulation magazines passed on his illustrations.

***I always thought you couldn’t ride African, as opposed to Asian, elephants. Apparently you can, although, according to animal rights advocates, you shouldn’t.

****As far as I can tell, this is Meserole’s first Vogue cover other than this February 1919 one, which is mostly white space:

*****Also, the cover artist, Neysa McMein, was a woman and an ardent supporter of gender equality. Here she is marching in a suffragist parade in 1917.

Neysa McMein marching in a suffragist parade, 1917.

New York Times, November 4, 1917

******Excerpt:

*******Moore-Park also drew the “is it a lady or a parrot?” August 1919 LHJ cover.

Magazine Covers Ring in the 1920s

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I’ve been in summer school at the University of Cape Town for the last three weeks, studying, among other things, Portuguese.* Between that, obsessing over the recently released archive of T.S. Eliot’s letters to his longtime love Emily Hale, and a pair of maritime mishaps that have been wreaking havoc on South Africa’s internet, I haven’t been able to get much blogging done. But it doesn’t seem right to let the first month of a new decade pass unrecognized, so I figured I’d look into how magazine covers ushered in the 1920s.**

The Saturday Evening Post rang in the new year with this J.C. Leyendecker cover. (The camel is a symbol of Prohibition.)

Sotheby’s website features this painting by Leyendecker, which may have been his original concept for the cover.

J.C. Leyendecker painting of baby with whiskey bottle and camel toy.

sothebys.com

I can see why the Saturday Evening Post wouldn’t go for it, but this version makes more sense because without the bottle of whiskey what is the baby shushing us about?

That’s about it for New Year’s-themed covers.

Erté, as always, is at the helm at Harper’s Bazar, with this cover,

which, unusually, has some text on the illustration: “Begin Arnold Bennett’s New Essays on Women in this Issue.” I skimmed the essay, which was in equal parts irritating, boring, and off-topic.***

Vogue starts out the decade with a Georges Lepape cover featuring a person of color, but not in a good way:

This Vanity Fair cover is too good not to repeat. I’m not sure who the artist is, but I’m guessing John Held Jr. or possibly Gordon Conway. (Update 2/4/2019: It’s John Held Jr. I found the signature on a scanned copy of the magazine on Hathitrust.)

There’s a George Brandt interior on House & Garden,

and a picture of movie star Norma Talmadge by Rolf Armstrong on Photoplay.****

The Crisis features a photograph of a woman from St. Lucia,

and Liberator has, um, something Bolshiviki by Lydia Gibson.

Life’s “Profiteers’ Number” features a cover by John Madison.

In sunny South Africa, I sighed over the snowy scenes on the covers of Literary Digest (by Norman Rockwell)

and Red Cross Magazine

and Country Life

and La Vie Parisienne.*****

If I could pick one snow scene to transport myself into, Mary Poppins-style, it would be this one, from St. Nicholas.

And, finally, two new****** publications that are well worth looking at: Shadowland, a beautifully designed movie magazine that features A.M. Hopfmuller as its regular cover artist,

and The Brownies’ Book, the first-ever magazine for African-American children, edited by, who else, W.E.B. Du Bois.

The Brownies' Book first issue cover, girl dressed as angel.

Battey

I’ll be following both of these exciting ventures in the months to come.

In the meantime, happy January, everyone. Or, as we say in Portuguese, feliz janeiro!

*The other things: Dante’s Purgatorio, special relativity, Rembrandt, Plato and Euclid, Vermeer, Virginia and Leonard Woolf’s Hogarth Press, religious poetry, South African history and politics, and the Enlightenment. I tend to shop for summer school tickets like a hungry person at the supermarket.

**It turns out that when you put 1920 in Google it thinks you’re talking about the whole decade, so I keep having to sift through irrelevant pictures of flappers. It’s going to be an annoying year.

***But don’t worry, Virginia Woolf will, with her brilliant 1924 essay “Mr. Bennett and Mrs. Brown” (published by the aforementioned Hogarth Press), make Arnold Bennet regret that he’d ever SEEN a woman.

****Armstrong also turns out to have illustrated the August 1918 Metropolitan magazine cover that won the surprisingly competitive Best Magazine Cover of a Woman Swimming with a Red Scarf on Her Head award.

*****This woman is, by La Vie Parisienne standards, displaying an unusual ability to keep all her clothes on.

******Or, in the case of Shadowland, almost new—its first issue appeared in September 1919.

My Life 100 Years Ago

A journey back in time