The daily Herald Tribunewas revolutionary, but the rebirth of the
Sunday paper was even more remarkable. The Trib’s Book Worldand New
Yorkmagazine were the prototypes of the modern newspaper supplement.
Although the Sunday New York Timeswas stuffed with various sections and
supplements, its makeup lacked a defining character. Conversely, Palazzo’s
Book World was typographically elegant—even to the untutored eye. He
rejected theTimes’s bland visual diet of famous works of art and stock
author’s photographs in favor of imaginative illustrations by contemporary
illustrators. These portraits, caricatures, and conceptual spots were entry
points providing access to the sometimes dense literary criticism. They also
synthesized, galvanized, and made accessible complex ideas. Although the
black-and-white line made them reminiscent of nineteenth-century book
illustrations (e.g., Tenniel’s for Alice in Wonderland), they were not nostalgic
interpretations of bygone themes.
The original New Yorkmagazine published as the Sunday
supplement of the Tribwas another milestone. There had been magazine
supplements in most Sunday newspapers dating back to the early 1900 s.
But New York’s seamless marriage of editorial and visual ideas was
unprecedented. It gave birth to both the “new journalism” (first-person
reportage) and a new graphic journalism (smartly packaged information
and visual essays). Typified by generous white space (unusual in
newspapers), elegantly unobtrusive Caslon typography, gritty photography,
and conceptual illustration,New Yorkwas a “slick” magazine on newsprint.
Its covers defined a new fashion: many of the images were ordinary yet felt
extraordinary through cropping and scale. The covers were single images
often of a typical New York scene, rather than illustrating a story inside. A
typical cover, a close-up of an everyday parking meter, was simple,
memorable, and so New York. The celebration of the mundane object was
consistent with trends in pop art.
Palazzo also transformed the “fronts” of all the other Sunday news
sections so that they were designed like magazines. Photographs and
illustrations were large, but rooted in good news judgment. Each section
had a distinct look, while conforming to the whole. Palazzo orchestrated a
presentation that neither fought with nor trivialized the news.
Unfortunately the new Tribdid not last long. In 1963 a crippling
newspaper strike forced an unhappy merger between three papers, the Trib,
the New York World, and the Journal American, resulting in the World
Journal Tribune. Although rooted in the design principles of the Trib, the
trifurcated daily failed to garner a sizable audience and did not survive for
long. In its wake, the New York Timesbegan its makeover, and other
newspapers followed suit. Yet in the beginning the New York Herald Tribune
stood alone but influenced many.
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