Enter Helen
Page 37
104Some nights in her apartment, she wondered: Ibid., p. 41. Helen wrote about imagining the goings-on in the apartments and lives around her, a theme she sometimes explored in her notes.
104More than a few of her neighbors were famous: Details about Helena Rubinstein’s apartment taken from Thomas W. Ennis, “Helena Rubinstein’s Apartment Is for Rent at $50,000 a Year,” New York Times, February 6, 1966.
105New York wasn’t interested in little girls: Helen Gurley Brown, early notes about New York, HGB Papers, SSC.
105“Jacqueline Kennedy orders mostly from sketches”: John Fairchild, front-page editorial, Women’s Wear Daily, July 13, 1960.
106“Why the fuck does this have to happen to me?”: Barbara Seaman, Lovely Me, p. 284.
106“As we have seen through our tears”: Helen Gurley Brown, “Woman Alone,” Los Angeles Times Syndicate, “Envy Not, Columnist Advises,” reprinted in Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, December 9, 1963.
14: PEACE THROUGH UNDERSTANDING
107“It was the perfect time to think silver”: Andy Warhol and Pat Hackett, POPism: The Warhol Sixties (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1990), p. 64.
107the NYPD finally arrested a suspect: Background on George Whitmore Jr. and Richard Robles from T. J. English, The Savage City: Race, Murder, and a Generation on the Edge (New York: HarperCollins, 2011); and Paul Vitello, “George Whitmore Jr., Who Falsely Confessed to 3 Murders in 1964, Dies at 68,” New York Times, October 15, 2012.
108Gernreich’s topless bathing suit: Bernadine Morris, “Topless Suits Go on Sale This Week,” New York Times, June 16, 1964.
108the nation’s first topless bar: David Allyn, Make Love, Not War: The Sexual Revolution—An Unfettered History (New York: Routledge, 2011), p. 25.
109As a girl, she had been to the World’s Fair in Chicago, twice: Helen Gurley Brown, unpublished autobiography 1962–63, HGB Papers, SSC.
109The tension between them had been building up: Helen talked about Cleo’s visit to New York City during the World’s Fair in Helen Gurley Brown and Lyn Tornabene, audio recording no. 2552b, “Emotions,” tape 8 (side B), HGB Papers, SSC.
109“Don’t pay any attention to her”: Helen recalled this story in the “Emotions” tape with Tornabene and in a later Cosmopolitan article idea memo, “NOTES ON GIRLS WHO GET HIT OR VICE VERSA,” alternately titled, “FAMILY FISTICUFFS,” Cosmopolitan article ideas, 1970s–1980s, HGB Papers, SSC. Dialogue is from the Cosmopolitan memo.
109She hit Cleo right there in the taxi: Ibid.
110“Practically everybody in the world is coming to the fair!”: “Stock Footage—TO THE FAIR! 1964 World’s Fair in New York City,” YouTube.
110For a ticket price of two dollars, fairgoers could visit pavilions: Background on the World’s Fair from Liz Robbins, “Around the Unisphere at the World’s Fair, Lives Changed,” New York Times, April 18, 2014; “Look Closer: 1964 New York World’s Fair,” waltdisney.org, June 16, 2012; Annie Colbert, “Travel Back 50 Years to 1964 New York World’s Fair,” mashable.com, April 23, 2014; Alan Taylor, “1964: The New York World’s Fair,” Atlantic, June 2, 2014.
111In states throughout the South, blacks tested their new rights: Peter Millones, “Negroes in South Test Rights Act: Resistance Light,” New York Times, July 4, 1964.
111what should have been a simple haircut: Ibid; and “Utilize Places Opened by Law,” CORE-lator (newsletter published bimonthly by the Congress of Racial Equality), no. 107, July–August 1964.
111Frequently, the testing met strong, sometimes violent resistance: Peter Millones, “Negroes in South Test Rights Act: Resistance Light.”
112“When these slick woman’s magazines”: Service of Chicago Daily News, “Equality for Women May Be Biggest Problem Raised for Employer by Rights Act,” Kansas City Times, October 2, 1964, HGB Papers, SSC.
112“Despite the thoroughness of your course program”: Letty Cottin Pogrebin to Mrs. Marjorie Brick, Berkeley School of Secretarial Training, August 7, 1964, press release for Sex and the Office, HGB Papers, SSC.
113“A publisher asked me to write a ‘me-too’ book”: Gloria Steinem, interview with the author, December 2013.
113“Both have suffered allegations”; “knowledge by nature”; “an ingenious combination”; “Sex and the Office doesn’t quite fit into George Orwell’s category of ‘good-bad-books’”: Gloria Steinem, “Very Basic Training,” a double review of Sex and the Office by Helen Gurley Brown, and Nine to Five and After: The Feminine Art of Living and Working in the Big City by Irene Silverman, New York Herald Tribune, October 18, 1964, HGB Papers, SSC.
15: IN THE MAIL
115“What is it like to be the little princess”: Joan Didion, “Bosses Make Lousy Lovers,” Saturday Evening Post, January 30, 1965, HGB Papers, SSC.
115On TV, she wore a wig: Helen Gurley Brown, Sex and the Office (Fort Lee, NJ: Barricade Books, 2004), p. 37.
115“I’m kind of outspoken”: Helen Gurley Brown and Joe Pyne in conversation on The Joe Pyne Show, YouTube, www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGl-yrGYs98.
115“terrible woman”: Ibid.
115“Well, Joe, it’s just that I think”: Ibid.
116One day, she climbed into a white, two-door Volkswagen Beetle: Accounts of this tour are from Joan Didion, “Bosses Make Lousy Lovers”; and Skip Ferderber, “Sex and the Single Back Seat Observer,” Crosscut.com, August 14, 2012, in which Ferderber recalled driving Helen and Joan around in the White Angel.
117“a very tired woman indeed”: Joan Didion, “Bosses Make Lousy Lovers.”
117“a twilight world”: Ibid.
118“over exposure signals on HGB”: Letty Cottin and Carol Hill to Helen and David Brown, November 17, 1964, HGB Papers, SSC.
118Among their ideas that never made it to screen: The food-themed quiz show was called Cook’s on the Fire, and the invention show was called Invention, Please, early 1960s, collected television scripts, HGB Papers, SSC.
118“EXPLAIN PLEASE!”; “how to change a tire”; “How it started with the Jews and the Arabs”: Helen and David Brown, Frankly Female, early 1960s, collected television scripts, HGB Papers, SSC.
119Nor did they have success with a comedy-drama series: Sandra (The Single Girl), early 1960s, collected television scripts, HGB Papers, SSC.
119“It is a series built around a female lead”: American Broadcasting Company (letter writer’s name not provided on copy), Mrs. Lucy Kroll, November 23, 1962, HGB Papers, SSC.
119“The only possible harm”: Helen and David Brown, The Unwind Up, early 1960s, collected television scripts, HGB Papers, SSC.
120“in the mail”: David wrote about this theory in his memoir, Let Me Entertain You (New York: William Morrow & Co., 1990), p. 132.
16: FEMME
121“Here’s a proposal for you”: Bernard Geis to Richard Deems, December 23, 1964, HGB Papers, SSC. Reproduced with the permission of Bernard Geis Associates.
121Helen’s epic tour finally slowed to a halt: Details taken from various correspondence between Helen Gurley Brown and Bernard Geis Associates, as well as from collected book tour itineraries and miscellany, 1962–69, HGB Papers, SSC.
122“It’s not the worst picture ever made”: A. H. Weiler, “Movie Review: Sex and the Single Girl (1964),” New York Times, December 26, 1964.
122“It was ridiculous, a horrible movie”: Rex Reed, interview with the author, 2014.
123“You know, Helen, you really ought to have a magazine for these girls”: Helen Gurley Brown and Lyn Tornabene, tape no. 10, “HGB Interview,” 1970–71, HGB Papers, SSC. Helen also described the process in David Brown’s memoir, Let Me Entertain You (New York: William Morrow & Co., 1990), p. 106.
123At a certain point, Charlotte Kelly: David Brown, Let Me Entertain You, p. 111.
123Among their ideas for monthly departmental features: Headlines and short quotes are from the Browns’ Femme prospectus, 1964, HGB Papers, SSC.
123Among their suggested headlines for major articles: Ibid.
124�
��The bathing-suit girl”: Helen Gurley Brown, undated introductory note, presumably for archive visitors, to the Femme prospectus.
125“For the woman on her own”; “U.S. Presidents Who Liked Girls”; “Where the Men Are”: Femme prospectus.
125“as a first class citizen”; “independent attitude”: Ibid.
126“This woman’s magazine will never deal with the problems of school lunches”: This quote, and following excerpt, ibid.
127What if the Browns told you: Ibid.
128“Spec said that he and Hefner would be glad to look at the prospectus”: Bernard Geis to David Brown, November 11, 1964, HGB Papers, SSC. Reproduced with the permission of Bernard Geis Associates. Geis wrote other notes to the Browns that fall about his attempts to shop the prospectus around to magazines including Esquire.
129“It looks as though they may fold it”: David Brown gave a detailed account of shopping around the Femme prospectus in Let Me Entertain You, p. 111–13.
129“You’re to telephone Deems”: Ibid.
129Hearst didn’t want to replace Cosmopolitan: Ibid.
129“How many copies does ‘Our Unadoptable Children’ sell”: Helen Gurley Brown, Cosmopolitan proposal, 1965, HGB Papers, SSC.
130“One of the first things Helen said to me”: Ruth Manton, interview with the author, March 2013.
131“I think Helen was cowering in a corner somewhere”: David Brown, Let Me Entertain You, p. 112.
17: FOR THE GIRL WITH A JOB
132“Helen Gurley got browner, browner, and browner”: From “Helen Gurley Wins a Holiday in Hawaii,” Glamour, May 1953, HGB Papers, SSC.
132Growing up, Helen inhaled magazines: Despite David’s comment that he’d never seen her read a magazine, Helen often wrote about loving movies and movie stars whose pictures she saw in magazines.
132ten women with modest incomes who still managed to show impeccable taste: Jennifer Scanlon referenced the Glamour contest qualifications in Bad Girls Go Everywhere (New York: Penguin Books, 2009), p. 29.
132Helen entered for the first time in 1951: Helen Gurley Brown, early notes on entering Glamour’s contest, and the application process, HGB Papers, SSC.
133Helen gave it her all: Ibid.
133“starts with that most basic commodity—one’s own self”: “Helen Gurley Wins a Holiday in Hawaii.”
134It also made her true ambitions known: Jennifer Scanlon, Bad Girls Go Everywhere, p. 29.
134it was her first time in a magazine office: Helen Gurley Brown’s account in David Brown’s memoir, Let Me Entertain You (New York: William Morrow & Co., 1990), p. 107.
18: THE MOST EXCITING WOMAN IN THE WORLD
135“She has no intention”: “Sex & the Editor,” Time, March 26, 1965.
135“FIRST DAY AT HEARST”: Helen Gurley Brown, entry in red diary, HGB Papers, SSC.
135David’s old mentor Herb Mayes was the first to call: David Brown, Let Me Entertain You (New York: William Morrow & Co., 1990), p. 30.
135David negotiated for a total annual compensation package of $35,000: In a letter to Richard Deems dated February 11, 1965, David Brown negotiated for Helen to be allotted $35,000 annually. James Landers confirmed this number in The Improbable First Century of “Cosmopolitan” Magazine (Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 2010), p. 224.
135“a spokeswoman for single women and girls with jobs”: Hearst press release, 1965, HGB Papers, SSC.
135“A lot of people will think we hired her”: “Sex & the Editor,” Newsweek, March 29, 1965, HGB Papers, SSC.
136“I don’t want to be a magazine editor!”: Helen Gurley Brown, I’m Wild Again: Snippets from My Life and a Few Brazen Thoughts (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2000), p. 171.
136Just in case, her contract included a stipulation: David Brown referenced this agreement in a letter to Richard Deems, February 11, 1965.
136become an astronaut or a brain surgeon: Helen Gurley Brown’s account in David Brown’s memoir, Let Me Entertain You, p. 107.
136“Ask the managing editor to have lunch with you”: Helen Gurley Brown and Lyn Tornabene, tape no. 10, “HGB Interview,” 1970–72, HGB Papers, SSC.
136she still went to bed feeling like she would be starting a prison term: From Helen’s account in David Brown, Let Me Entertain You, p. 107.
136In 1965, what is known today as the Hearst Tower: Background on Hearst Magazine Building from Landmarks Preservation Commission, February 16, 1988, Designation List 200, LP-1625; background on collaboration between William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Urban from Anthony Ramirez, “An Urban Landmark in Manhattan Grows by 46 Stories,” New York Times, September 18, 2005.
138a simple light-blue jersey dress: Helen recalled her outfit in David Brown, Let Me Entertain You, p. 108.
138a rumor pinballed around the offices: Account and dialogue from former Cosmopolitan secretary Vene Spencer, interview with the author, September 2014.
139“It came as a complete shock”: Ibid.
139she started by inviting her new employees into her office: Account of meeting Helen Gurley Brown for the first time, and what he office looked like, ibid.
139She did her homework: Ibid.
140Betty promptly turned her down: Helen spoke about her early challenges with the staff at Cosmopolitan in Helen Gurley Brown and Lyn Tornabene, audio recording file no. 2553b, tape no. 9 (side B), 1970–71, HGB Papers, SSC.
140“The magazine is bubbling with enthusiasm”: “Sex & the Editor,” Time.
140Almost instantly, there was mutiny: Helen Gurley Brown and Lyn Tornabene, audio recording file no. 2553b, tape no. 9 (side B).
141When she asked to see what was scheduled for future issues: Helen Gurley Brown’s account in David Brown, Let Me Entertain You, p. 108.
142“You don’t need literary people”: Helen Gurley Brown and Lyn Tornabene, audio recording file no. 2553b, tape no. 9 (side B).
142“I went to sleep but it didn’t take”: Helen Gurley Brown’s account in David Brown, Let Me Entertain You, p. 108.
143“That wasn’t her”; “When it seems to you as though she’s being a storyteller”: Walter Meade, interview with the author.
19: THE JULY ISSUE
144“I hope to have a magazine that reflects life”: “Sex & the Editor,” Newsweek, March 29, 1965, HGB Papers, SSC.
144Apparently mailroom runs were beneath her: Helen spoke about her early challenges with the staff at Cosmopolitan in Helen Gurley Brown and Lyn Tornabene, audio recording file no. 2553b, tape no. 9 (side B), 1970–71, HGB Papers, SSC.
144“Mrs. Brown,” Robin said: Ibid.
145At some point every day, Helen picked up the phone and called David: Helen detailed her struggles and reliance on David early on at Cosmopolitan in David Brown, Let Me Entertain You (New York: William Morrow & Co., 1990), p. 109.
146“a bosom she doesn’t make much of a fuss about”: “Are You a JAX Girl”: Cosmopolitan, July 1965.
146“What’s this one?”: Helen Gurley Brown and Lyn Tornabene. Helen recalled finding her first cover girl in audio recording file no. 2553b, tape no. 9 (side B).
147she was the first Cosmo cover girl under Helen Gurley Brown: Biographical details about Renata Boeck per Renata Boeck, interview with the author, August 2014.
147“They were looking for someone famous”: Ibid.
147“Ten minutes later, I got a call”: Ibid.
148“She wanted cleavage”: Ibid.
148“It is the case of the untreated woman”: Robert A. Wilson, Feminine Forever (New York: M. Evans and Company, 1966); and Joe Neel, “The Marketing of Menopause,” NPR, August 8, 2002.
149“from puberty to the grave”: Robert A. Wilson, Feminine Forever.
149“honey of a hormone”: Lin Root, “Oh What a Lovely Pill!” Cosmopolitan, July 1965. (Even though Lin Root is the credited writer, Helen told Lyn Tornabene that she rewrote the article in audio recording 553b, tape no. 9 [side B], 1970–71, HGB Papers, SSC.)
149“My skin is fresher”: Lin
Root, “Oh What a Lovely Pill!”
149years later, studies showed: Joe Neel, “The Marketing of Menopause.”
150“I mainlined Premarin for years”: Meryl Gordon, “Hormonal Imbalance,” New York, July 22, 2002.
150Above all, she wanted Cosmopolitan to feel personal: Helen described Cosmo’s tone as being like the voice of an older sister in an article by John J. Goldman, Los Angeles Times, reprinted as “Ask Helen Gurley Brown: “Can a Small Town Girl Achieve Fame in the City,” Tuscaloosa News, May 5, 1971.
150In a rush to fill the position of managing editor: Helen told Lyn Tornabene about offering the job to various staffers, audio recording file no. 2553b, tape no. 9 (side B).
150several other editors had worked at the magazine for years: A. R. Roalman gave a great overview of Cosmopolitan’s staff and modus operandi in “The New Cosmopolitan,” Writer’s Digest, August 1966.
151“For information on children”: Ibid.
151Helen used to call her “a white-knuckle girl”: Walter Meade, interview with the author.
151“Don’t come at me with the inexpensive, off-season vacation story”: A. R. Roalman, “The New Cosmopolitan.”
151she wanted the fiction to reflect this new demographic: Ibid.
152Liz had been writing about movies and movie stars: Biographical details about Liz Smith per her memoir Natural Blonde (New York: Hyperion, 2000), passim.
152“She was just a little girl from Arkansas like I was just a little girl from Texas”: Liz Smith, interview with the author, May 2013.
152“like icebergs—only partly visible to mortals” and following: Liz Smith, “Mr. and Mrs. Burton One Year Later,” Cosmopolitan, February 1965.
153Liz Smith had come in to work expecting to be fired: Smith described job-hunting along with her colleagues in Natural Blonde, p. 199.
153“Well, Lizzie, what shall we do with you?”: Ibid., p. 200.
153“a glorious unfettered, sexy and seductive paean”: Ibid.
154“I’ll never forget—she was so shy and deferential”: Liz Smith, interview with the author, May 2013.