Links from the past with relevance today:
NEWNOWNEXT: Tab Hunter died at 86 a year ago. Now, his husband, Allan Glaser (b. 1959), is opening up about his death, which came out of nowhere.
NYT: Iconic Italian leading leady Valentina Cortese has died at 96.
INDIEWIRE: Woody Allen, 83, says he will never retire.
HISTORIANS.ORG: The failure of Ebony and Jet — which is the fate of all magazines, even iconic and ground-breaking magazines such as they were — is leading to an unconscionable auction of the companies' archive of photos. Hopefully, a museum will swoop in:
It's “relatively unique” to even see an archive listed as an asset in a corporate bankruptcy filing, says attorney Rick Meller of the Chicago law firm Fox Swibel, which represents the trustee in this case. (Other Johnson Publishing assets that must be sold separately include a collection of couture dresses that were part of the company’s long-running Fashion Fair, an annual event launched by Eunice Johnson, Johnson’s wife and a tycoon in her own right, as well as the groundbreaking Fashion Fair cosmetics brand.) Many publishers don’t consider their photo archives worth the upkeep. But the Johnson Publishing Company did. It’s because of the efforts of an African American family running a business over generations that this massive visual documentation of American history has survived.
At the same time, the archive has been extraordinarily difficult for researchers to access over the years. A corporation simply isn’t obliged to throw open its doors to the public, even if it’s well aware of the historical nature of its holdings. Now, however, if it’s bought by a philanthropist and donated to a public museum or library, there’s a possibility that everyone could gain access to a huge slice of American history.
BOY CULTURE: Remembering the late, great Vince Edwards, who was born this month.
