WELCOME BACK: We return to the Roaring Twenties this issue, and I had a lot of fun doing so. Our last visit to that exciting decade let me down quite a bit, if you recall that was my admittedly uninspired look at a 1927 issue of the Atlantic two issues ago. This time our random issue is The American Magazine and the greatest problem that I'm having in putting this issue together is that I can't put that issue down!

We'll take an intimate and hopefully interesting look at the June 1928 edition of The American Magazine down below, but first our updates and little odds and ends about buying and selling magazines.

UPDATES: I did manage to find the time to create a few new pages in between last issue and this one. Of course, there is the continuing saga of The Sporting News of the late 1950's, and though I am a couple of pages behind on those they will be updated by next week. In case you were worried that I was converting to an all-sports site with all of these new Sporting News pages, never fear, there is a new page detailing the history of the Saturday Review of Literature and another page about collecting Norman Rockwell with a focus on Rockwell ads. The Rockwell page is actually a spin-off of this month's random issue, so I will provide the link again a little further down in this issue.

I also recently acquired a nice early collection of Ladies' Home Journal from before, during, and just after the period Bok became editor and am currently reading the excellent "Reformer in the Marketplace" book about Bok, Curtis and the Journal, so look for a pretty detailed page about that publication sometime soon. I've also added a page describing my magazine collecting and research bookshelf, so you can find some of the same titles that I use to put this site together.

AUCTIONS: Besides those Ladies' Home Journal issues mentioned above, other sales items coming soon are 1940's LIFE, 1958 and '59 The Sporting News, Saturday Evening Post including ten issues I listed at auction this past Wednesday night from 1906-1909 in above average condition. There will be another set of listings next week from that same group including more Harrison Fisher covers.
 

SOMEWHAT UNRELATED, YET SOMEWHAT RELATED: I might be behind the curve on this one, but I wanted to make mention of a program which has become a weekly viewing must for me. It's the History Detectives show over on PBS, which has a great website detailing all of its past episodes. I just came upon this within the past six months or so, so I was surprised to see the show has been around since 2003 and I've been watching re-runs all this time! Anyway, the site announces that the new season starts June 19th, so I'm excited about that.

The show seems made for me, which is why I think you may like it. There are four "detectives" from the world of collectibles and auctions, even one sociologist I think, who help people solve "cases" relating to either keepsakes or collectibles that they have. There are often old magazines involved in solving the cases and one of the episodes that I recently watched delved deep into authenticating some original early illustrations by Arthur Szyk. Very interesting show, I highly recommend it, and if you already know about it, good for you!

OUR RANDOM ISSUE:
 

...See, when I originally planned this issue I wanted to do as I had in a previous Random Issues and give a brief summary of each writer and artist included in the issue. My mistake, or my reward, was beginning with Clarence Budington Kelland, who I figured would be the easiest choice to start with because his name so commonly crops up in old magazine issues. Not so. Most of the info about Kelland on the net refers to the fact that he is forgotten and nobody knows much about the man now. So, due to the length of this issue, I'll only include the link here to what I hope is now the best Clarence Budington Kelland page available on the net.

WRAP-UP: So, have you made it this far? We basically read that issue together I think, though I do apologize for forcing you to follow my poor reading habits -- I think my skimming and skipping is a pretty realistic approach to how our 1928 reader would have taken on this same issue though. Of course, each person could tackle this Random Issue and come out with a completely different article than I, perhaps concentrating on Doc Kinkade and Harry Houdini, rather than being drawn into the argument between Albert Payson Terhune and Harold Bell Wright and getting caught up in the life of Clarence Budington Kelland, but I hope that's what makes these issues fun for you as it does for me.

Otherwise I'm just blowing a lot of hot air. Oh well, maybe I am anyway, but I promise I'll be back in about a month to do it some more! Until then, if you're collecting old magazines I hope to see your address on a few of the packages I send out over the next few weeks! Thanks again, and have a great month!