journalism history
- Eleni Epstein, fashion history, fashion journalism, Ford Library, journalism history, Washington Star
Inauguration & Fashion Journalism
There has been heavy media coverage of what First Lady Michelle Obama might wear to the Inauguration tomorrow. Here is an example from ABC News. The First Lady’s fashion sense would have been appreciated by fashion journalist Eleni Epstein who covered my first ladies – including Jackie Kennedy. Eleni Epstein was the longtime fashion editor at the Washington Star. Her papers are in the National Women & Media Collection. Here is a link to a calender from the Ford Library which shows the First Lady meeting privately with Eleni Epstein. My article about Epstein took more than six years to research and write. It will come out next year in…
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Death of Dear Abby columnist
“Dear Abby” – Abigail Van Buren — the pen name of Pauline Friedman Phillips – died yesterday. Her national syndicated advice column was common in the women’s pages of newspapers for decades. In one column, she wrote about one of my favorite women’s page editors Maggie Savoy. Here is a link to the column. I am pleased to see how much attention has been paid to Van Buren’s death as often soft news does not get much respect.
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More About Fashion Editor Marji Kunz
I received some great material about Detroit fashion journalist Marji Kunz. Here is an earlier post about Marji. The letter above is from Marji to Paul Myhre, director of the Penney-Missouri Awards – the top recognition for the women’s pages. It can be found in the papers of the Penney-Missouri Awards at the State Historical Society of Missouri. Marji won two Penney-Missouri Awards for her reporting on fashion.
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Eugene Patterson Has Died
Eugene Patterson died yesterday. According to his obit: “He wrote about the civil rights movement at a time when many Southern newspapers were reluctant to cover it.” He headed the St. Pete Times (now the Tampa Bay Times)in the years when former women’s page editor Anne Rowe Goldman served as ombudsman. Here is a link to a story about Patterson naming Goldman to her position. Several Southern newspapers were champions of civil rights but overlooked inequities that women faced – including in the newsroom. There is a comment in the book Orange Journalism which noted that Goldman should have promoted higher but was not because she was a woman.
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History of Restaurant Reviewers
I am writing an entry about restaurant reviewers for the Encyclopedia of Food and Agriculture Ethics. Other than Duncan Hines (this was before he became better known for his cake mix company), most reviews of restaurants were found in the food sections of the women’s pages. The NY Times’ Craig Claiborne is probably the best known early newspaper food critic as he invented the four-star rating system. Jane Nickerson had reviewed restaurants for the NYT prior to Claiborne. Here is a previous entry about food critics and the women’s pages.
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History & Social Media
I recently wrote a newsletter article for Clio – the publication of the History Division of AEJMC. I wrote about the need for mass communication educators to use social media. I made the reference to Twitter and Western Union telegrams – both use short forms of writing. This image is from the papers of Roberta Applegate in the National Women & Media Collection. Roberta was a groundbreaking women’s page journalist in Detroit and Miami in the 1950s.
