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It was a little piece of creative heaven before the fall from grace. What followed for Southern Progress Corporation and its people was a New York publishing invasion, a lot of pain and a chance for many people to reinvent themselves. For Birmingham, the real question becomes what to do with all of the creative folks cast out.
by Jesse Chambers
Many writers, designers and photographers will tell you that Southern Progress Corporation in Birmingham is, or was, a damn near Edenic place to work.
At Southern Progress, these creatives could practice their craft at a high level while living in laid-back, family-friendly Birmingham, rather than being forced to hustle for a buck in a busy media Gomorrah like New York or Chicago.
The SPC campus on Lakeshore Drive, with its atrium, water features, roof garden and lush landscaping, was a sort of High Holy for anyone in Birmingham who wanted to be in publishing, while also drawing talented people from across America.
Photographer Brit Huckabay was a Chicago freelancer in 1995 when he walked into the SPC headquarters for the first time. He was delivering a story to Cooking Light magazine art director Susan Dendy. "I've been in magazine offices before," Huckabay says. "But [at] SPC, oh my God, you walked in and went, 'Holy crap, this is like walking into a cathedral. It's like you hear angels singing.' And I thought to myself, 'I want to work here.' It was just so beautiful."
Things were also beautiful on the business side for several decades.
SPC's flagship title, the iconic lifestyle magazine Southern Living, was created in 1966 by publisher Emory Cunningham and soon became the most successful regional magazine ever.
SL tapped an affluent, underserved, mostly female market. It kept increasingly urbanized Southerners in touch with their rural roots, according to scholar Tracy Lauder. And it gave its mostly white, middle-class readers a sense of pride when the South was held in low esteem nationally during the turbulent Civil Rights era.
Other successful SPC products followed, including more magazines, books from Oxmoor House, the Southern Living at Home direct-sales program and even cooking schools and themed cruises.
This created work for talented people like Huckabay, who gave up his thriving Chicago freelance business, moved to Birmingham with his wife and, after freelancing for SPC, was hired by Oxmoor House.
And the success of SPC, a homegrown company, was an economic boon and source of pride for Birmingham.
But like many tales featuring a Garden of Eden or Shangri-La, this story doesn't necessarily end well. In fact, the ending is perhaps still being written.
SPC has suffered heavy layoffs in recent years, due to the worst economy in America since the Depression, as well as radical changes in the business model for magazine publishing brought on by the Internet.
And some say that SPC's recent difficulties may have been exacerbated by poor management and even cultural insensitivity on the part of Time Inc. in New York, SPC's parent company. Time bought SPC in 1985 for $498 million—the most money ever paid for a publishing operation at that time.
In any case, SPC's old family atmosphere and, perhaps, its feeling of exceptionality, changed forever, and many former staffers have been forced to reinvent themselves.
Now Birmingham finds itself with a potentially valuable pool of talent without enough work to go around.
Before the layoffs, before what a former art director calls "the Fall,"many employees found what they believed was a special place to work at SPC. More than likely, most of them will never find such a place again.
According to former SL travel writer and editor Joe Rada, "The initial impression I had of [SPC], and it lasted for a long time, was how polite the society there was. It was the epitome of Southern culture. It was a growing company, always expanding, introducing new sections, new divisions. And everybody was nice. Everybody was polite, positive Southern boosters. The whole corporate concept was the good life in the South."
A Charleston, WV, native, Rada was working for a newspaper near Seattle, WA, in 1988 when he got an offer to come to SPC, travel the South and write about interesting people and fun vacation spots. "It was too good of a job to pass up," he says. Rada remained at SPC for 21 years.
Many former staffers talk about what they call SPC's family atmosphere. Nick Patterson was an associate editor at SL in what became the Travel & Livings department. "[former CEO Tom] Angelillo, it would never fail that if he saw me in the hall, he would stop and ask me what I had been doing. And [former SL editor in chief] John Floyd would have meetings with his staff every week. 'Java with John' it was called. Basically he would answer any question from anybody on the staff." A former Birmingham Post-Herald reporter, Patterson worked at SPC for nearly 10 years and is now director of communications for Birmingham Museum of Art.
SPC was known for providing employees with opportunities for personal growth and experimentation, at least more so than most big companies. "I was probably the first editor that was ever asked to write a story who had never typed a word in their life," Charlie Thigpen says. "They wanted me to write because I was a gardener, not because I was a writer, and I thought it was interesting that they wanted a hands-on perspective."
Thigpen began working on the grounds at SPC while in high school and became director of landscape and SL associate gardens editor.
"Southern Progress was a complex place to work," Thigpen says. "You had brilliant executives, you had creative people, like artists, you had test kitchens. You'd be walking down the hall and smell bacon cooking. It was very different, a lot of creative forces."
SPC management—early in their firm's marriage to Time Inc.—took pains to assert their relative independence from New York. According to Don Logan of Birmingham, who was SPC president and chief operating officer at the time, "When the company was sold, we stressed to [Time Inc.] how different the culture was at SPC and how important it was that local management be in charge of the editorial content, marketing and other departmental functions," he says. "People in New York wouldn't understand the nuance of the South's culture and how it related to our business. There was some push back at the beginning, but we pushed back, too. And SPC operated for 20 years with people from SPC managing the bottom line with great success."
Not long after the sale, Logan became Southern Progress CEO and served for seven years. He moved to New York to serve as president and chief operating officer of Time Inc. in 1992. He became CEO of Time Inc. in 1994. Logan now owns Seek Publishing and the Birmingham Barons minor-league baseball team.
Logan praises the CEOs who followed him at SPC, Jim Nelson and Angelillo, and recites the traditional Southern Progress recipe for success. "[The firm] did well through that period, because everybody was passionate about what they did, and it was a family atmosphere, and they worked hard," Logan says. "And SPC contributed a big chunk of Time Inc.'s profits."
Logan discusses the changes the Internet brought to the magazine business in the early 2000s. "People were asking if magazines were still relevant and would they survive," Logan says. "My opinion was that there were too many magazines that were dividing up a shrinking revenue base. The ones that were commodity-driven, or of broad, general interest, struggled the most where there was more TV and Internet competition." According to Logan, magazines that offered a commodity such as news faced more competition than those that offered something unique.
"Magazines that I thought would do well were lifestyle magazines, be it a Southern Living kind of magazine with food, home, garden and travel folded under Southern culture," Logan says. "There's nothing else like it. The editors are selecting, choosing and presenting the topics that a reader is most passionate about. All the information may be on the Internet, but it is not organized nor packaged like a magazine. I thought these magazines would do O.K. and have the ad revenue to support them."
One event that would complicate the relationship between Time Inc. and SPC and have deleterious effects on SPC, at least indirectly, was the acquisition of Time Warner Inc. in January 2000 by internet company American Online Inc for roughly $180 billion in stock and debt.
The goal in combining the companies was to create synergy—a period buzz word— between AOL's Internet assets and the vast reservoir of content, including TV, movies and magazines, that Time Warner provided. But Logan was opposed to the deal. "I was totally against it," he says. "Nobody asked my opinion. I would have given it to them. Because of the valuations, putting the two companies together didn't make economic sense."
According to Logan, AOL had a higher market value than Time Warner, even though Time was much larger and its many divisions were performing well. "I wouldn't say that AOL was valued too highly, because it really was a function of the market values of the day," he says. "It was priced like Yahoo and some of the others. But all the Internet companies were priced too high."
The AOL-Time Warner combination didn't work. AOL's internet service provider business deteriorated, and the market value of AOL and other similar companies began to drop. This created pressure for cost-cutting in relatively healthy divisions at Time in order to keep up the all-important stock price of the combined company. "AOL continued to erode, and the stock price eroded, and there was a huge pressure to get profits up for Time Inc.," Logan says. "It eventually put pressure on SPC."
The relationship between Time Inc. and SPC also began to change, according to Logan, who was made chairman of AOL-Time Warner's Media and Communications Group in 2002. "I don't think the people running [Time Inc.] understood the difference in content in the magazines and the importance of having Southern culture permeate the book," he says. "And that really begin to be dialed up as I was nearing retirement in January 2006."
According to Logan, SL had a devoted readership with huge renewal rates and could charge more for advertising, in addition to other healthy metrics. And Cooking Light and some of the other titles were doing well. "I don't think that was valued or understood as it should have been in New York, and some changes were made that, in my opinion, never should have occurred," he says.
One of the biggest changes at SPC came in late October 2008, when Angelillo and three other executives abruptly retired. "They replaced all the top management at SPC all at one time, eliminating a huge amount of the company's historical knowledge," Logan says. "They centralized a lot of functions that had been done at SPC, from accounting and legal and HR and some ad sales and circulation. When you take those functions out, you don't have the culture of a stand-alone company anymore."
The departure of Angelillo and the others was a body blow, according to Charlie Thigpen's wife, Cindy Cezar Thigpen, SL creative services director at the time. "[That] was the day that really shook us to the core," she says. "We knew that we would never, ever be the same."
I asked Logan whether he served as SPC's protector prior to his retirement from AOL-Time Warner in 2006, as some former employees believe. "I don't want to characterize it as protecting, because it was SPC's bottom-line performance that was doing the protecting," he says. "Southern Living,Cooking Light, Sunset and a host of their businesses did very well. I did oppose centralization of all the corporate function because I don't believe in centralization. I believed that an independent SPC was in the best interest of Time Inc. and the Time-Warner shareholders."
The fall of 2008 was a horrible season financially for the magazine industry, including Time Inc., where—according to Erik Sass of mediapost.com—ad pages were down 9.3 percent through the first nine months of the year.
Lay-offs began in earnest at SPC on October 23, with about 30 people, mainly in accounting and editorial, losing their jobs. This came only a few days after SL editor-in-chief John Floyd retired after 18 years and Cottage Living editor-in-chief Eleanor Griffin took his place. The chilly gale winds blowing toward the lush, suburban home of Southern Progress were making themselves felt.
On November 19, 2008, three weeks after Angelillo's sudden departure, Time Inc. announced that it was closing Cottage Living after only four years. It was also announced that most of the staffers, as well as the publisher, of Cooking Light were resigning, along with several more SPC execs.
Such trademark SPC workplace perks as fresh fruit, free mouthwash and fancy pod-style coffee makers had already begun to drop away, in what some former employees look back on now as a series of small portents of the coming apocalypse. "All those things started to go away," Patterson says. "And so there were these little things that showed you that things were changing. And you know, the glory days were going."
Amanda Storey, marketing manager for Cooking Light magazine, saw signs that things were getting tougher in both the economy and the magazine business. "We were fighting for business," Storey says. "In 2008, it became less about big ideas and how we were going to do great partnerships. Advertisers didn't have the same amount of money that they had."
The close-knit SPC family was buzzing with worries about possible lay-offs, according to Storey. "No one was quite sure what was going to happen," she says. "Rumors were everywhere. I mean, if you just read the news media, the New York Times, you keep seeing SPC coming up. You start thinking, 'Oh, that's not good.'"
It was still a shock for Storey when her entire marketing team was laid off in November 2008. "We knew something was up and we knew there were going to be layoffs," she said. "But no one in a million years thought it was going to be our marketing department. We were a very high functioning, solid marketing group. I don't any of us were prepared for that."
The layoffs and other changes at SPC continued in 2009. Time Inc. sold Southern Living at Home. Southern Accents magazine was closed in August. Wade Kwon of mediaofbirmingham.com—a former associate features editor at SL whose position was terminated in December 2008—reported in October that SPC had cut 41.4 percent of its Birmingham staff in the previous 12 months, eliminating 290 positions, and that all Southern Progress titles had lost ad revenue.
Rada and a number of other staffers in the SL Travel & Livings department, including Patterson, were terminated in November 2009. "As I understand it, it was strictly business," Rada says. "The magazine business was shrinking. Nothing personal. I survived several waves of lay-offs. So it wasn't a complete surprise. The surprise was that I was no longer going to get to do the job I love to do. I really thought I was a lifer and would be able to keep on doing that as long as I wanted. Maybe I wasn't realistic about that in the job culture of this recession. So I can't say I was totally surprised to get caught up in the latest layoff, but I wasn't prepared to move on. It was hard to let go. I always thought it would happen to someone else."
The shock was magnified for some staffers by the feeling that SPC was so successful that it would be almost immune from Time Inc. layoffs. According to Patterson, "For many years we'd been told that SPC, and Southern Living in particular, were very lean and not viewed as having too many staffers. The idea we were given was that we shouldn't worry about layoffs because we were already very efficiently run, making a lot of money. So I know that for a lot of people it was very shocking to start to see what happened."
Patterson had prepared himself emotionally for his termination. "I was expecting, because of the way things had been going, that eventually I was going to get laid off, and I was one of several people who were not exactly dreading it," he says. "Things had gotten to the point that it was difficult to work there, just from a mental [and] emotional standpoint."
Layoffs were tougher for people who had been with SPC for most of their professional lives, according to Patterson. "I felt particularly sorry for those of my colleagues who had been there for a very long time," he says. "I had been there almost 10 years. Many people had been there longer [and] had really only worked [at SPC]. They had their whole lives tied up with working there. Their whole identity seemed to be connected with their work. I was kind of philosophical that it was time to do something else."
The fact that SPC had once maintained such a family atmosphere made it tougher for some people to let go, Patterson believes. "I think for a lot of people, they thought they were being disconnected from that," he says. "And not all of us had been there forever, so I think that makes a difference, but there were definitely people who felt they were being uprooted, disconnected, forcibly torn away from everything they had known."
It should be stressed that the lay-offs at SPC and Time Inc. were not unique, since the entire magazine business experienced similar trauma. Scott Jones was an executive editor, formerly a food editor, at Southern Living until leaving the company in December 2010 to start a business. He describes a situation faced by one of his friends at another large publishing firm. "When Conde Nast decided to replace longtime Bon Appétit editor Barbara Fairchild late last year and move the magazine from Los Angeles to New York, a friend who's an editor there recounted how the staff was inexpressively informed one afternoon that the magazine was moving and that they'd likely have a chance to reapply for their jobs," Jones says. "When I asked her if there was mention of financial assistance to make the move to the other coast, she simply replied, 'Nope.'" In January, Jones formed Jones Is Hungry (www.JonesIsHungry.com), a culinary media company focusing on custom food and wine content, brand representation, TV production, and education.
Layoffs and buyouts have continued regularly at Southern Progress from 2008 to 2010, according to Kwon in a recent email. "The cuts come from different operations at different times, making them more difficult to track," he says. "Also, the company has continued to hire people while terminating others, but the overall Birmingham-based staff size has shrunk by at least 50 percent if not more."
There have been fears locally that Time Inc. has done away with its SPC subsidiary and fully absorbed all of its operations. According to Kwon, SPC is "now known as the Birmingham division of Time Inc." Time spokesperson Debra Richman identifies SPC as a subsidiary of Time Inc. in a recent email. According to Richman, day-to-day operations are run by Birmingham-based executive Bruce Larson, and the following products still have staff based here—SL, Cooking Light, Coastal Living and Health, as well as Oxmoor House and some web sites.
According to Birmingham Business Journal, citing Publisher's Information Bureau, SL and Coastal Living ad revenues fell in 2010, but revenues at three other titles—Cooking Light, This Old House and Health—were up.
So what are the prospects for SPC and, especially, the long-beloved SL? I asked long-time SPC watcher Samir "Mr. Magazine" Husni, an expert on the magazine business who teaches at the University of Mississippi. "The problem with Southern Living and [SPC] is they not only faced the economic collapse, but they had a lot of personnel changes and changes in the magazine's DNA that made them lose some of their footing with the readers, with their base," Husni says. "Does Southern Living now have the same impact as in the '80s and '90s? No. Is it a must read. Debatable. They still have a huge circulation No one is writing off Southern Living."
According to Husni, he was told in the 1990s that SL had an astonishing 20 percent penetration of Southern households. He says this success was based on delivering a familiar, comfortable product. "The magazine was very predictable and traditional," he says. "Now it's hit and miss. They're trying to reinvent the wheel. Time Inc. should have left SPC alone, but you never find a big company that buys an established magazine and leaves it alone."
According to Husni, not all magazines should follow the contemporary formula of big pictures and short, snappy articles. "That can be [Time Inc. lifestyle magazine] Real Simple," Husni says. "It's doing great. But that doesn't apply to all magazines. Southern Living had this sophistication of upholding the Southern tradition of women, even in the 21st century. Nobody is saying Southern women just stay in their kitchen and cook, but they look at the magazine with a halo around it. 'My mother got it. My grandmother got it.' We stick to traditions in the South, for better or worse. If it's December, I want my white cake on the cover. If it's November, I want the Thanksgiving feast. People loved the predictability. That's gone. It's become just another women's magazine that just happens to have the name Southern Living."
Lindsay Bierman became SL editor in chief in July 2010, taking over for Eleanor Griffin, who became the magazine's vice president of brand development. Bierman previously served as SL deputy editor, I asked Husni if he thinks that Bierman is in full control of the magazine—the way John Floyd was—-or whether the real power is now in Manhattan. "The power left Birmingham years ago," Husni says. "All you have to do is go to the office. It does not take a genius to walk through the hallways at Southern Progress and (realize) you hear your echo."
However, Bierman—who responded to my questions with an extensive email—asserts that he is very much in control at SL. "I work for our readers," he says. "As long as they're happy, my bosses are happy." He says he has a good relationship with Time Inc. editor in chief John Huey, a native Southerner, and editorial director Martha Nelson, and that "they understand and appreciate the culture here."
[Bierman expressed confidence at the time of our email exchange in the leadership of Time Inc. CEO Jack Griffin, who assumed the position last year after having worked at Meredith, a Midwestern lifestyle magazine firm with a corporate culture that is somewhat similar to that of SPC. However, as we went to press for our March issue, Griffin was fired as CEO. It is interesting that Husni and Logan had some nice things to say about Griffin. According to Husni, "Without running down the previous regime—I respect [former Time Inc. CEO] Ann Moore and the others—but I think Jack is more down to earth and more in touch with service magazines. With his background, by hook or by crook, he may force them to go back to that DNA." Logan told me that Griffin would "understand the cultural issues better than the previous regime." Logan was also hopeful regarding the future of SL. "[It] is a still powerful brand and has a huge impact on the South," he says. "I am hopeful that some of the changes that occurred can be reversed."]
What about the working relationship between Birmingham and New York? "We at Southern Living operate independently, but because I'm looking for any advantage, I'm happy we can share our knowledge and resources in areas such as consumer research, cover strategies, and digital assets with our colleagues in New York," Bierman says. According to Bierman, there are no plans to move any of the products managed in Birmingham to New York.
Bierman strongly defends the health of SL. "[It] is the sixth-largest monthly consumer magazine in the country with a rate base of 2.8 million," he says. "We have very healthy circulation metrics and maintain a higher average price than the bulk of our competitive set" According to Bierman, ad and beauty ad pages are up in SL, and the magazine published several best-selling books in 2010.
Bierman says that SL is relevant to its traditional audience "now more than ever." He says that the magazine is "like the ultimate social club" and was "the region's first form of 'social media.'" He cites several examples of his commitment to keeping the editorial content truly Southern, including signing up Alabama author Rick Bragg to write the regular "Southern Journal" feature. "I want Southern Living to be a must-read for the daughters and granddaughters of our longtime subscribers," he says. He also wants to make SL "a magnet for creative talent."
In any case, former SPC staffers have to move on with their lives, despite their sense of loss and disappointment—something felt, after all, by millions of Americans in this so-called Great Recession.
According to Huckabay, "You can talk to anybody. We love that place. It's like watching your parents break up and your family split apart, and it's just heartbreaking. It was the most special place in the world to work. And to see it come apart like that—I never, ever would have predicted what was to come."
Huckabay lost his job in 2009 when Time Inc. sold Southern Living at Home, where he had worked for several years. Huckabay is once again a freelance photographer and numbers Willow House—the new incarnation of SLH, based in Birmingham—among his clients.
Huckabay fears Birmingham will be unable to provide work for all who need it. "I know people who are struggling just to make it through, [especially] with the economy," he says. "That really is the eventual end of the story. A lot of these people are not going to be able to stay here. Birmingham is too small. This isn't Atlanta. This isn't Chicago."
Former SPC food stylist Jan Moon sees some of the creative people who were laid off at SPC struggling. "You have to reinvent yourself," she says. "If you've been, say, an art director, there's not a lot of demand for that. The people who are doing that are still very artistic people. They need to be pointed in a direction and do something for themselves."
Moon left the company on good terms in 2005, before the lay-offs, to focus on her passion for baking, including wedding cakes. She is the owner of Dreamcakes bakery in Edgewood and freelances for SPC. "I developed some recipes for them at Christmas for Cooking Light," she says.
Charlie and Cindy Thigpen resigned from SPC and opened their own business, called Charlie Thigpen's Garden Gallery, at Pepper Place in 2009. Charlie likes being his own boss after his experience at SPC. "At my age, I wanted to be more in control of my destiny," he says. "I wanted to be in charge, because everything went so well with Southern Progress for so long, and just kind of started crumbling."
In some ways, the process of midlife reinvention is just another adventure for Rada, who has always built his life around a search for new experience. "Even before I came to Southern Living, I was an adventurer," he says. Rada's been a lifeguard, street musician and cannery worker. He's been an avid backpacker and hang-glider. Married with two kids, Rada is keeping an eye out for full-time work while writing freelance and developing bakeryboyblog.wordpress.com, a website for people who love baking and bakeries.
Rada says he isn't bitter regarding his layoff. "I had 21 good years at Southern Living, and I enjoyed working there," he says. "I realized the downsizing was just business. I'm ready to move on. I'm still looking for what comes next, a year afterwards. I wish them well. I hope they wish me well."
Storey, who worked at SPC for nearly eight years, is now assistant vice president of Community Health & Wellness at the United Way of Central Alabama and is project director for Healthy Kids, Healthy Communities, an effort to fight childhood obesity. She writes an Alabama-centric food blog called foodrevival.com.
Many former SPC employees remain in close touch, according to Storey. "I think most people are still meeting for lunches and Facebooking back and forth," she says. "And thank God for Facebook, because in that moment it gave us that connection that we would have all lost. It was really painful for a lot of folks who had been there 20 or 25 years."
Many former staffers still miss the old SPC. "There is a lot of nostalgia, especially for people who were there in what I call the glory days," Moon says. "It was a great creative outlet, and we all worked as a good team. You spend that much time with people, you build some really good, lifelong friendships. And we do really all care about each other and what's going on in each others' lives."
Storey believes that many of the layoffs were probably inevitable from a business standpoint. Does she have any problems with the way they were handled? "Sure," she says. "But could I have done any better? I don't know. What is the best way to lay off a bunch of people? I don't think any company has figured out the best way to do it. I think because there was a regional difference, it was hard for [Time Inc.] to see what this was like and live it every day. And vice versa. Talk about economic climate. New York was impacted in ways even we can't fathom. We would all wish that it happened a little more delicately, or that maybe the band-aid was ripped off a little faster, but I don't know that it could have been avoided."
If Time Inc. failed to really understand SPC, it is perhaps not surprising given the differences between the companies. "I think it's the uniqueness of what Southern Progress had built," Rada says. "SPC grew out of the South, by, for and about the South. Larger corporations like AOL and Time Warner, and the combination AOL-Time Warner, are much more global or national brands. So it's a different corporate culture. "
According to Storey, it isn't healthy for Birmingham to look for villains or wallow in the bad news from SPC. "When things like this happen, we have a tendency to point fingers," she says. "I don't want the lay-offs to define [Birmingham] or the community of creative individuals It's really easy to focus on the drama of it. And it was and still is very dramatic. It was very hurtful. It was very challenging. There were a lot of talented people vying for work here, a lot of families who had to pick up and move. You know, it's just a matter of getting creative and being able to redefine what your good at and do it in a way that serves a larger vision for a community of people."
Birmingham developer Cathy Crenshaw believes that the painful layoffs at SPC may have a hidden upside. "To me it really has been a creative seed pod bursting," she says. "There are so many people who have been here for a long time, and they are creative and smart, and they could go other places, but they want to stay in Birmingham." Crenshaw has helped provide storefronts or office space at her Pepper Place complex in Lakeview for several former SPC staffers. "We've tried to nurture people," she says. Examples include the Thigpens and former SPC executive Bruce Akin, who runs the start-up firm Chip Rewards.
Storey agrees with Crenshaw. "If all that knowledge, all that creativity, all that work ethic [from SPC] were funneled into something else, I guarantee you this community could transform itself," Storey says. "If the community is able to invest in the people out of that building, it could transform our opportunities, our culture, everything. That is what's exciting about it.
Southern Living editor Lindsay Bierman Q&A
Lindsay Bierman is editor in chief of the iconic lifestyle magazine Southern Living, which is published by Birmingham's Southern Progress Corporation (SPC). Bierman became editor of SL in July 2010. He participated in this email Q&A with Jesse Chambers of B-Metro for use in Chamber's new story Southern Gothic, about the recent history of SPC. Southern Gothic is found in our March issue. This is the complete text of the Q&A.
B-METRO: Is Southern Living a healthy magazine? If so, what are the metrics (e.g., circulation, ad revenue, subscription renewals) that show this to be the case?
BIERMAN: Absolutely—Southern Living is the sixth-largest monthly consumer magazine in the country with a rate base of 2.8 million. We have very healthy circulation metrics and maintain a higher average price ($4.99) than the bulk of our competitive set. I'm particularly happy to say that under my leadership, renewal intention among the youngest demographic is at an all-time high. We also saw an increase in both short-term and long-term subscribers in 2010 over 2009. There have been challenges on the ad side for all magazines, but through the first quarter of 2011, our fashion and beauty pages are up more than 200%! Some of our newest advertisers include Lancôme, Olay, Dove, and Pond's, and I must say it's nice to see the face of Julia Roberts on the back cover of our current issue. Southern Living also published several best-selling books in 2010. My favorite, The Big Book of BBQ, was a category best-seller (selling well over 100,000 copies), and our mega cookbook, 1001 Ways to Cook Southern, has been doing extremely well regionally. Last year was one of our best years ever for bookazine sales, and the staff will tell you that I'm truly giddy about the release ofSouthern Living Weddings: Your Ultimate Guidebook to Style on January 21 [2011], a 128-page special issue priced at $11.99.
Is Southern Living as a brand still relevant to its traditional audience?
Now more than ever! We're blessed to have a loyal following of more than 15 million readers—"an army of devoted fans" as the subject of one recent story put it—whose identity as Southerners transcends all other affiliations, no matter where they live or what they do. It's like the ultimate social club, and Southern Living was the region's first form of "social media." Right now, we're only at the beginning of our expansion across platforms, including TV and the Web, but the magazine will always be the core of our beloved and trusted brand.
Have you been able to retain the "Southernness" of Southern Living? Does it retain its cultural uniqueness?
Who else would stuff fried chicken with pimiento cheese or use sweet tea as an ingredient instead of a drink? You need to join us for a tasting in our Test Kitchen! Southern Living remains the heart of Southern life, and all of us at SL, whether transplants or natives, celebrate our love of the South's food, culture, style, and way of life in every issue. I've studied the work of my predecessors here, and Lord knows I have big shoes to fill—I'm standing on the shoulders of giants who were keepers of our culture. John Floyd, arguably the most iconic SL editor of all, was a longtime mentor for me, and I'm still asking him for advice! My challenge will be to honor their legacy, so the first thing I did as editor was sign up Rick Bragg to write our long-standing back page, "Southern Journal," to reflect on the ethos of being Southern as only Rick can do, with such humor and raw emotion. Since then, we've featured everything from the South's best legal moonshine—as chosen by staffers who rated them all late on a Friday—to our favorite recipes for black-eyed peas on New Year's Day. This spring, we're launching a new column called "Only in the South" to celebrate our uniquely Southern traditions and eccentricities such as a happy hour in Marble Falls, Texas, that's not for cocktails but for PIE. In the next issue, we're running an exclusive interview with William Faulkner's niece, whose new memoir tells all about life with the South's most iconic author. Our Southernness will always be our number one asset, it's what makes my job so endlessly fascinating and rewarding.
Has Southern Living changed over the last few years in its style and content?
Our core content will always be the same—a celebration of Southern cooking, gardening, decor, and travel across the region. But everything and everyone has to evolve, so the pages have been freshened up with new typefaces and design elements over the past couple of years. And every editor, including me, has played around with the front section from time to time. The redesign of 2009, under Eleanor Griffin's leadership, introduced many new columns that continue to resonate with readers. Last fall, we introduced some health and beauty content, which seemed new to us but was actually an integral part of the magazine in the 1960s. It was funny to see a woman with a bouffant hairdo in a black leotard demonstrating a "five-minute workout" on our pages in 1966! We may change what we do and try out new ideas, but we will never change who we are.
What are your plans and hopes for the future?
I want Southern Living to be a must-read for the daughters and granddaughters of our longtime subscribers. That's my mission and my mantra, and I know from readers and research that our longtime subscribers share that goal. I also seeSouthern Living as a magnet for creative talent—a place where editors, writers, foodies, and other creative types want to work because the passion they have for our culture can inform, inspire, comfort, and entertain millions of readers. Finally, I want to showcase and support Southern entrepreneurs, designers, and shopkeepers. We should be their first big break! In that way, Southern Living can help drive economic growth across the region.
What is your particular challenge at SL? What do you have on your mind on the typical morning when you point your car toward work?
Imagine producing not just one magazine every month but a dozen! It took me months to wrap my mind around all our regional and state editions and all our licensing deals and book projects, and the wild pace of putting out a home/travel/food/garden/health+beauty magazine all in one. It would certainly be easier to publish just one edition, but we'd miss out on a lot of rich material out there. The real value of Southern Living is how deep we get into the heart of small and rural communities to better reflect the region's rich cultural and geographical diversity. It's ambitious, especially when you're trying to shoot everything in season and maintain the highest quality of writing and reporting, but I wouldn't have it any other way. I wake up in the morning with the same concerns that anyone in media or business has—budgets, staffing, ad sales, etc.—but mostly I'm just feeling excited about whatever issue we're working on. Almost every day, I see a photo that takes my breath away or read something inspiring or drive past a beautiful house or eat somewhere that gives me a story idea. I'm so lucky I get to live my job. I have all the same questions as our readers, such as what color to paint the living room, what to make for dinner in a hurry or serve guests, where to stay in New Orleans, and what on earth to do with the empty pots on my deck. And I love getting to know our readers from the hundreds and hundreds of letters I get every month.
What is the working relationship between SPC staffers in Birmingham and Time Inc. in New York?
It's no secret that we live in very challenging—and exciting—times for media. We at SL operate independently, but because I'm looking for any advantage, I'm happy we can share our knowledge and resources in areas such as consumer research, cover strategies, and digital assets with our colleagues in New York.
Are you fully in control of the magazine and its direction?
Yes. I work for our readers. As long as they're happy, my bosses are happy. But magazines are a collaborative effort. I'm surrounded by writers, copy editors, designers, and so many others behind the scenes whose enthusiasm and expertise never ceases to amaze me. Imagine working every day with the best cooks, garden gurus, storytellers, and tastemakers! I'm also fortunate to work for some of the very best minds in the business: Time Inc. Editor in Chief John Huey and Editorial Director Martha Nelson, who now oversee all SPC titles. John, who spends most weekends at home in his native Charleston, has a particular affinity for Southern Living, which is truly great for us, and Martha has run some of the most successful magazine brands in the history of publishing. They understand and appreciate the culture here, and I'm excited about our future under their leadership.
I've been told that new Time Inc. CEO Jack Griffin, who comes from Meredith, which has a similar DNA to Southern Progress, might be a good fit from SPC's viewpoint, that he gets the cultural uniqueness of the SPC titles, particularly Southern Living. Would you like to comment on that?
I'll be introducing Jack to our Birmingham staff in the near future and feel at ease about his leadership, given his outstanding record in our category.
[NOTE: As we mention in the online version of Southern Gothic, Griffin was fired as Time Inc. CEO after we went to press.]
Any chance that any of the products managed in Birmingham could migrate to New York?
No, we don't have plans to move any of the products managed in Birmingham to New York.
Tags: Alabama, Birmingham, business, Jesse Chambers, Rebirth, Southern Progress


text:
Director Roman Polanski will be transferred Friday from prison to an Alpine chalet, according to Swiss authorities.
His release was delayed after the court agreed to bail in the amount of $4.5 million earlier this week. Authorities were waiting for the sizeable payment.
Polanski is set to leave prison at 1 p.m., Friday, Zurich time. He will be under electronic security surveillance.
The 76-year-old will stay at the Swiss Alpine chalet as officials decide whether to extradite him to LA for having sex in 1977 with a 13-year-old girl. Folco Galli, the Swiss Justice Ministry spokesman, said Polanski could be in his new home by early afternoon.
Polanski has been in Swiss custody since Sept. 26 after 31 years as a fugitive. He was arrested on a U.S. warrant when he arrived in Zurich to receive an award.
Authorities in Los Angeles want him returned, but they have yet to say much about recent developments.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
New York Military Records
This entry was originally written by Roger D. Joslyn, CG, FUGA, FGBS, FASG for Red Book: American State, County, and Town Sources.
Most pre-twentieth-century New York military records are at the New York State Archives, although some were destroyed or damaged in the 1911 fire at the New York State Library. Other material, including indexes and other resources concerning the New York State Militia and National Guard, is at the New York State Military Museum and Veterans Research Center, 61 Lake Ave., Saratoga Springs, NY 12866 www.dmna.state.ny.us/historic/mil-hist.htm].
Volumes 2 and 3 of the Annual Report of the State Historian (Albany and New York, 1896, 1897) contain collected lists of colonial militia, reprinted by Genealogical Publishing Company of Baltimore as New York Colonial Muster Rolls, 1664'1775, 2 vols. (2000), in which the age, birthplace, and occupation are given for many soldiers. Muster Rolls of New York Provincial Troops, 1755'1764, volume 24 of the New-York Historical Society Collections (1892; reprint, Bowie, Md.: Heritage Books, 1990), edited by Edward F. DeLancy, is another transcript of many of the same records.
Berthold Fernow, New York in the Revolution, vol. 1 (New Orleans: Polyanthos, 1972; Baltimore: Clearfield Co., Inc., 2000), was originally volume 15 of Documents Relative to the Colonial History of the State of New York (Albany: Weed, Parsons and Co., 1887). Additional names are in New York in the Revolution as Colony and State, 2 vols., and Supplement (Albany, N.Y.: J. B. Lyon, 1901, 1904; reprint Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co. Inc., 1996), and in Calendar of Historical Manuscripts Relating to the War of the Revolution, 2 vols. (Albany, N.Y.: Weed, Parsons and Co., 1868). To find other documents in the state library and state archives, consult Stefan Bielinski, ed., A Guide to the Revolutionary War Manuscripts in the New York State Library (Albany, N.Y.: New York State American Bicentennial Commission, 1976). See also Milton M. Klein, comp., New York in the American Revolution: A Bibliography (Albany, N.Y.: New York State American Revolution Bicentennial Commission, 1974). A lot of Revolutionary War material burned in the 1911 state library fire, but the remaining charred fragments are at last being microfilmed and made available for research. The state archives is preparing a computerized name index to New York soldiers and other individuals mentioned in the surviving Revolutionary War manuscripts. Other Revolutionary War material sent to Washington before the 1911 fire should be sought in the National Archives (see The New York Genealogical and Biographical Record, 120 [1989]: 66).
There is much published and manuscript material on New York Loyalists. One of the best works is Harry B. Yoshpe, Disposition of Loyalist Estates in the Southern District of the State of New York (New York: Columbia University Press, 1939). Alexander C. Flick's Loyalism in New York During the American Revolution (New York: Columbia University Press, 1901) includes summary lists of Loyalist lands sold by the Commissioners of Forfeitures. Some Loyalist material is at the New York Public Library and the state archives.
Hugh Hastings, ed., Military Minutes of the Council of Appointment of the State of New York, 1783'1821, 4 vols. (Albany, N.Y.: J. B. Lyon, 1901'04), with volume 4 as an index, lists local officers and is useful for determining the area from which a War of 1812 soldier probably served when only his unit commander's name is known. Published material on New Yorkers in the War of 1812 is scarce, but one list put out by the New York (State) Adjutant General's Office is Index of Awards on Claims of the Soldiers of the War of 1812 (1860; reprint, Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1969). The original claims are at the state archives, which also has abstracts of War of 1812 payrolls.
Research into Civil War participants from New York should start with the excellent The Union Preserved: A Guide to Civil War Records in the New York State Archives, comp. By Daniel Lorello and ed. by Harold Holzer (Albany and New York: Fordham University Press and the New York State Archives Partnership Trust, 1999). This guide covers some material outside the state archives. There is a typescript index of Civil War participants from New York at the state archives, as well as an online database index at www.archives.nysed.gov/a/research/res_topics_mi_civilwar_dbintro.shtml. If the regiment is known, see Register of New York Regiments in the War of the Rebellion, 43 vols., issued as supplementary reports to the Annual Report of the state adjutant general for 1893'1905 (Albany, N.Y.: J. B. Lyon and others, 1894'1906). The annual reports are indexed in Richard A. Wilt, New York Soldiers in the Civil War'¦, 2 vols. (Bowie, Md.: Heritage Books, 1999). A Record of Commissioned Officers, Non-Commissioned Officers and Privates...in Suppressing the Rebellion, 8 vols. (Albany, N.Y.: Comstock & Cassidy, 1864'68), and Registers...the War of the Rebellion (Albany, N.Y.: J. B. Lyon, 1894), not indexed by name, were compiled by the New York Adjutant General's Office. Frederick Phisterer, comp., New York in the War of the Rebellion, 1861'1865, 6 vols. (Albany, N.Y.: J. B. Lyon, 1912), lists officers only. The National Archives'Northeast Region and the state library have the microfilm index of compiled service records of New York volunteer soldiers in the Union army. The state archives has much material on the Civil War, including town clerk's registers, which often show the soldier's full name, full date and place of birth, and names of parents, including mother's maiden name. Civil War soldiers and deaths of officers and enlisted men were also noted in the population schedules of the 1865 state census, and veterans or their widows were listed in a special 1890 census (see [[New York Census Records]).
FamilySearch.org has a variety of collections available for free online:
Richard H. Saldaña, Index to the New York Spanish-American War Veterans, 1898, 2 vols. (North Salt Lake City, Utah: AISI Publishers, 1987) is a reprint with an index of the original three-volume report issued by the state adjutant general in 1900, arranged by regiment. In addition, a card file of New York participants in this war should also be checked at the state archives, which also has World War I card files of New York state servicemen and navy nurses. Cards of the 'old men,' fourth draft registration for World War II for the five New York City boroughs arranged alphabetically are at the National Archives'Northeast Region (see Leslie Corn, 'World War II Fourth Registration Draft Cards: A Newly-Released 20th-Century Resource for 19th-Century Research,' The NYG&B Newsletter, 13 [2002]: 5-9).