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Bloomberg Businessweek December 23, 2019As late as July 1930 we were still optimistically pointing to “a fistful of
strawthatshowbusinesswindshave turned,” including record June sales of
Packardautomobiles.McGraw-Hill went ahead with plans for a blue-green
artdecoheadquarterson Manhattan’s 42nd Street, moving intoit
inlate1931.(Thelandmarkedbuildingstillstands,thoughit’shalf-
envelopedbythePortAuthority Bus Terminal.)
ButastheDepression gathered force, the editors turned into
strongadvocatesforaggressive action to revive the U.S. economy.
Ata timewhentheU.S.Chamber of Commerce and others urged the
federalgovernmenttobalance its budget, The Business Week under-
stoodthattheeconomywas suffering from a shortage of demand
andthatgovernmentwas the only player capable of filling the gap.
InOctober 1930 themagazine complained that the Federal Reserve
was“standingidlyby.”In March 1932 we condemned a consump-
tiontaxbillintheHouse as “fiscal suicide” that would cause “fur-
therdeflationandcontraction.”
It wasoneofthemagazine’s finest hours. “Business Week’s edi-
torialsofferedperhapsthemostsophisticatedKeynesian-styleeco-
nomicanalysisofanymass publication, and its influence may have
beendisproportionateto its circulation, as it targeted an elite audi-
enceofbusinessmen,”wroteRanjit Dighe, an economics professor at the
StateUniversityofNewYorkatOswego,ina 2011paper.
Theprobableauthorofthoseeditorials, Virgil Jordan, was the first in a long
lineofbrillianteconomistsandeconomic journalists to write for the magazine.
AnotherwasLeonardSilk,Ph.D.,later a columnist for the New York Times,
whowroteforthemagazinefrom 1954 to 1969. Silk attempted to bolster
readers’trustin economists,writing in 1959 that the profession “has moved
a longwaytowardtherealismand practicality sought by business and gov-
ernment.”SilkhiredWilliamWolman, a Stanford Ph.D. who continued to write
andeditforthemagazineuntil2001. Wolman in turn hired Michael Mandel, a
HarvardPh.D.whobecamea theorist of the New Economy and stayed with
themagazineuntil 2009.
Asidefromchronicling the lousy economy, the Business
Weekofthe1930s helped invent the modern role of the
chiefexecutiveofficer. Writing about management became
a staple of the magazine as the postwar
explosion of new businesses and technol-
ogies called for a shift toward professional
managers who had the analytical skills to
quickly assume responsibility in unfamiliar
enterprises.Thearchetypeofthisnewuber-
manager was General Motors CEO Alfred P.
Sloan,whosedata-drivenapproachbecame
oneofthemostinfluential business strate-
gies of the 1950s.
Sloan in 1950 donated more than $5 mil-
lion to launch the graduate business school● 1944
Freelance correspondent Roscoe
Fleming notices a leap in uranium mining
and asks a professor at the Colorado
School of Mines what applications
the element might be used for. The
professor says, “Well, you could make a
lot of paint, or a lot of china, or you might
just blow Berlin off the map.”● 1942
Women appear on the cover for the first time.● 1944
Business Week is forced
to turn away advertising
because of a paper
shortage.● 1947
Boyd France of Reuters swims out
from a French port to interview Jewish
Holocaust victims aboard the Exodus
1947 , which the British had barred
from landing in Palestine. The next
year he joins Business Week, where he
served as chief White House and State
Department correspondent before
retiring in 1986.● 1948
Business Week
covers the invention
of the transistor
at Bell Telephone
Laboratories:
“Makers of hearing
aids, broadcasting
equipment, electronic
computers, and a host
of other electrical
goods will eye the
new device.” MINE:COURTESYLIBRARYOFCONGRESS.SCRAPPOSTER:CHRONICLE/ALAMY.EXODUS:APPHOTO.TRANSISTOR: COURTESY OF NOKIA BELL LABS. MENANDS: COURTESY TOWN OF COLONIE HISTORIAN▼ 1940s