The idea of mysterious flying saucers piloted by extraterrestrials had, by the 1950s, been popularized to such an extent that even Time magazine’s Circulation Department wanted in on the fun. The magazine itself was less inclined to dabble in science fiction or conspiracy theories, but a letter sent out to potential subscribers nevertheless reported on…

On October 31, 1969, Time published “The Homosexual: Newly Visible, Newly Understood.” While the controversial piece discussed the public’s growing consciousness of the gay community, it also presented harmful stereotypes, a reflection of the markedly conservative coverage of gay rights issues Time maintained throughout most of its history. At the height of the AIDS crisis, in June…

Between 1945 and 1960 the number of television sets in use in the United States rose from a few thousand to approximately 60 million. Although many of the programs shown originated in New York City, many of Gotham’s denizens had to endure a steadily degrading signal reception. The cause: new buildings in the vertically growing…

In mid-December 1952, a plane from the United States Embassy in Singapore landed in Saigon, Vietnam. The passenger aboard was Henry R. Luce, head of Time Inc., who was there to see what was increasingly becoming another front in an expanding war against Communism. Luce spent a couple of days in Vietnam, visiting both the north…

The 1960 presidential election presented a quandary for Henry R. Luce, head of Time Inc., the largest publishing business in the world. A Republican whose aid had previously propelled Wendell Willkie and Dwight D. Eisenhower to the Republican nomination, he now had to choose between Richard Nixon and a man he admired but who stood for the…

This post was written by Samantha Brown, Time Inc. Assistant Archivist. While processing the Time Inc. Subject Files, I came across a mysterious object buried among the papers. Sitting in an envelope next to the other papers in a file was a quarter. The envelope said that Mr. Roy Larsen, the editor of LIFE, had received…

This post was written by Luis Rodriguez, Collections Management Specialist. In 1964 the advertising agency Doyle Dane Bernbach created a provocative and effective ad for Lyndon B. Johnson’s presidential campaign. It juxtaposed a young girl counting the petals on a daisy with the launch and detonation of a nuclear weapon, thus attacking the more hawkish…