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The Birth of LIFE

© Earl Rickard

In 1936 Henry Luce had the motive, means, and money to publish a national picture magazine; so he did. The first issue hit the newsstands in mid-November. The magazine sold every copy and lost money for the next three years. The Magazine -- LIFE.

Luce founded Time magazine in 1923; by 1935 the magazine made a 2.2 million dollar profit. In the late 1920s Luce noticed that scores of quality business articles written for Time failed to make the magazine because of space limitations. He estimated there were enough articles for an entire business magazine; hence, in 1929, Luce created his second successful magazine -- Fortune.

The idea for LIFE was more visceral; Luce just had a hunch that a picture magazine with the right stories and presentation would succeed in the American marketplace. The advent of the small, mobile 35mm camera spelled the end of dull, staged pictures. Original, creative photography captured peoples imaginations; therefore, Luce forecast success for a magazine presenting such photos backed by well written stories. Nevertheless, production costs were expensive. To highlight pictures over text, the magazine had to be printed on high quality paper with a larger page size than standard magazines. Moreover, to make a profit without being over priced the magazine would have to sell for no more than a dime.

LIFE succeeded beyond Luce or anyone's wildest dreams. The first issue sold out the entire 466,000 copy press run leaving distributors begging for more. Within a year LIFE had a circulation of over a million.

But Luce, predicting LIFE's circulation at 250,000, made one nearly fatal error: He sold advertising rates too low. The low rates combined with the expensive heavy coated paper needed to reproduce quality pictures caused a $50,000-a-week loss. LIFE ran up a six-million-dollar loss before the magazine turned a profit in 1939, when circulation roared past two million.

The first issue, dated November 23, 1936, set the tone for one of the most famous magazines in American history. Regular features destined to become familiar to millions of Americans for decades to come debuted in LIFE's first issue: the picture essay, art reproductions, "LIFE Goes to a Party," and "LIFE's Newsfronts of the World."

LIFE magazine's editors introduced their brand new creation with a page two picture of a doctor holding a newly born infant by its feet; the caption read "Life Begins." On the opposite page the editors described in "Introduction to this first issue of LIFE" how they had sent photographer Margaret Bourke-White to photograph the new Fort Peck Dam on the Columbia River. "What the Editors expected -- for use in some later issue -- were construction pictures as only

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