In the corner conference room of our offices, a seven-foot-tall bookcase spans an entire wall, and 30 years. It houses the past issues of Stanford magazine, all 124 of them, beginning with the Fall/Winter issue of 1973. There’s a lot of history in there.
On page 2 of Volume 1, No. 1, is a letter from Ralph Davidson, ’50, who was then publisher of Time magazine and president of the Stanford Alumni Association. His letter begins: “The Stanford Magazine is unequivocally about Stanford University—its memorable past, its dynamic present, its bright future.” They were the first words in what would become an admired institution in its own right and an important instrument of alumni connection.
It began, as start-ups often do, on the equity of spunk and conviction. Davidson and founding editor Della Van Heyst wanted a publication that exemplified the quality of the university it covered. “Ralph said, ‘Stanford is a great university; it needs a great magazine,’” Van Heyst recalls.
Most alumni publications 30 years ago were insular in coverage and outlook, and they appealed primarily to people in their schools’ inner circles. Van Heyst aimed higher—she wanted “a real magazine” whose writing, design and personality were good enough to compete successfully against newsstand publications for readers’ attention. Charged with engaging all alumni, not only those closest to the University, STANFORD from the very beginning interpreted the Stanford community broadly, in all of its complexity and diversity. It won readers and it won acclaim.
The variety and substance over the years is striking—faculty research, contemporary debate, student life, institutional analysis, history, biography, humor. The magazine has covered the famous and not so famous—senators and CEOs, Harley riders and hay farmers. And it has regularly been ahead of the curve. In 1985, a cover story featured a young assistant professor of political science named Condoleezza Rice. In 1995, the magazine introduced readers to the Cardinal men’s golf team, whose newest member was a gangly freshman his coach called “potentially the greatest golfer who ever lived,” Tiger Woods. In the September 2001 issue, mailed a few days before Afghan-trained al-Qaida terrorists attacked the World Trade Center, Stanford profiled Mary MacMakin, a 72-year-old activist who had recently been kicked out of Afghanistan by the country’s fundamentalist regime for her work on behalf of women and children. (Two months later, the Taliban was gone and MacMakin was back.)
Obviously, much has changed since 1973. Generations of students came and went. The campus grew, and so did the strength of Stanford’s reputation. But the magazine’s approach is essentially the same as it was when Davidson articulated it three decades ago: to “feature stimulating articles . . . offer glimpses of research and other endeavors that have an impact on the quality of our lives . . . look over the shoulders of today’s students . . . and seek to capture the enduring spirit and atmosphere of a unique institution.”
Here’s to the next 30 years.
