Cosmopolitan magazine

Cosmopolitan Magazine was first published in 1886 as a family magazine, but became a literary magazine in the late 1960s. Today, Cosmopolitan is a popular and trusted women's publication that covers topics ranging from relationships and sex to news, pop culture, and fashion. Cosmopolitan has 63 international editions printed in 32 languages and is distributed in more than 100 countries around the world.

Cosmopolitan started using colour photography of models around 1950. These covers were interspersed with illustrated covers.

They seem to have gone over completely to photography by 1963.

This is part 4 of a 4-part series on Cosmopolitan Magazine:

1948 January
Cover by Coby Whitmore

1948 February
Cover by Coby Whitmore

1948 AprilCover by Coby Whitmore

1948 May
Cover by Coby Whitmore

1948 June
Cover by Coby Whitmore

1948 July
Cover by Coby Whitmore

1948 September
Cover by Coby Whitmore

1948 November
Cover by Coby Whitmore

1948 December
Cover by Jon Whitcomb

1948 December
Cover artwork by Jon Whitcomb

Jon Whitcomb (1906 –1988) was born Weatherford, Oklahoma. It was during his college years that Whitcomb got his first paying art jcommission, painting movie and vaudeville posters for the Palace Theatre in Cleveland. After graduation he continued to paint posters, and eventually joined a commercial art firm where he really learned his trade. As his work improved and grew more confident, the firm sent him to its New York office, where he was able to branch out into the wider field of advertising and illustration for national magazines such as The SaturdayEvening Post, Ladies’ Home Journal, and Cosmopolitan.

Whitcomb spent time in the Navy during World War II, where he put his talents to good use creating recruiting posters that made the women in WAVES (Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service) look like glamorous “Whitcomb girls.” He was also sent to the Pacific as a combat artist.

Although he found it difficult to readjust to civilian life, and worried that he would be too far out of date, his career never faltered. He produced a series of articles and sketches about Hollywood stars for Cosmopolitan called "On Location with Jon Whitcomb." Looking back on his career, he credited his success with his ability to figure out what people like to look at - and to give it to them.

1949 February
Cover by Coby Whitmore

1949 March
Cover by Jon Whitcomb

1949 April
Cover by Al Parker

Alfred Charles Parker (1906-1985) a founder of the modern glamour aesthetic defined the progressive look and feel of published imagery at a time of sweeping change, when Americans, emerging from the trials of economic depression and war, sought symbols of hope and redemption on the pages of our nation’s periodicals.

His innovative modernist artworks created for mass-appeal women’s magazines and their advertisers captivated upwardly mobile mid-twentieth century readers, reflecting and profoundly influencing the values and aspirations of American women and their families during the post-war era.

1949 May
Cover by Coby Whitmore

1949 June
Cover by Jon Whitcomb

1949 July
Cover by Edwin Georgi

Edwin Georgi (1896 – 1964) was a leader in the second wave of "pretty-girl" artists: more like pin-ups without actually being pin-ups. Largely self-taught, learning his way up in ad and art agencies. He was a pilot in WWI. His style ranged from simple, poster-esque lines and colours to his more famous pointillist pieces with boldly directed light, a unique use of warm shadows, and sparkling colours. He did advertisements for Webster Cigars, Woodbury, Ford Mercury, Crane paper, Yardley, The Italian Line. In-demand illustrator for Goldenbook Magazine, Fortune, Redbook, Woman's Home Companion, Cosmo, True, Esquire, Ladies' Home Journal, Saturday Evening Post, American Girl, Liberty.

1949 October
Cover by Jon Whitcomb

1949 NovemberCover by Coby Whitmore

1949 December
Cover by Edwin Georgi

1950 February
Cover by Jon Whitcomb

1950 March
Cover by Jon Whitcomb

1950 April
Cover by Jon Whitcomb

1950 May
Cover by Coby Whitmore

1950 July
(artist not found)

1953 July

"Hostage"

Illustrated by Thornton Utz

Thornton Utz, a southerner, Thornton Robyn Utz was born in Memphis, Tennessee in 1914 where his father worked as a craftsman in horse-drawn carriage trimming until he moved over to automobile upholstery. From a very young age, Thornton Utz began drawing and illustrating without any professional training. He made his own comic strips to pass out to schoolmates. By high school, Utz had received encouragement from his teachers to pursue a career in the arts. His passion for art and illustration would build into a defining style that heavily influenced advertising and illustrating throughout the 1950s and 1960s.

In the mid-1960s, Utz’s wife Louise fell ill and the artist took time off from his work to take care of her at the house. The family moved to Sarasota, Florida for her health where Utz was able to return to his work as an artist. He founded a cartography business designing maps.

1953 August
"Hostage"
Iluustrated by Frederic Varady

Frederic Varady (1908 - 2002) had a distinctive style later in his career. When browsing through the Varady tear sheets in the Walt Reed Illustration Archive, it is interesting to see how his style evolved throughout his career. His illustrations from the 1940s appear to be the typical two-color illustrations that were popular during this time period. It appears that he started using lines as a technique to add interest and depth to his illustrations sometime in the mid-1940s. Perhaps he had established himself enough as an illustrator to take creative liberties with his work, which resulted in illustrations that felt more progressive than his earlier pieces. Varady’s work shifted drastically in the 1950s. His illustrations from this decade embodied a flattened, modernist style.

1953 September
"The Trouble with Erica"
Illustrated by Arpi Ermoyan

Arpi Ermoyan (?-2018) was an illustrator, editor at Cosmopolitan in the 1950s and ’60s, worked at Doyle Dane Bernbach ad agency, wrote an important book called “Famous American Illustrators,” curated gallery exhibitions of illustration art, and for many years directed the Society of Illustrators. She was one of very few women to break through in that male-dominated field.

In 1953, she and her husband Suren — also a noted illustrator, who served as art director at Good Housekeeping — moved to Tanglewood Lane, off Stony Brook. She became part of the vaunted Westport Illustrators group — again, one of the few female members. Illustrators in Westport during this era used each other for models all the time, and Arpi was a favourite. Several great illustrators of the era were inspired by her striking good looks and painted her into their illustrations.

1953 October
Cover by Al Parker

1953 November
"Lesson for the Day"
Illustrated by Coby Whitmore

1953 December
"Heritage"
Illustrated by Al Parker

1954 July
"It was unreal as a nightmare -"
Illustrated by Robert G. Schneeberg

1954 August
"Sahara Flight"
Illustrated by Robert Fawcett

Robert Fawcett (1903–1967) was an English artist. He was trained as a fine artist but achieved fame as an illustrator of books and magazines. Born in England, he grew up in Canada and later in New York. His father, an amateur artist, encouraged Robert's interest in art. While in Canada, he was apprenticed to an engraver.

He attended the Slade School of Art in London, then returned to the United States to pursue a career in fine arts, although he had to work as a commercial artist to support himself. He soon became disenchanted with the poor pay and political infighting of the fine arts world and decided to commit himself to commercial art, where he was successful. He was the author of On the Art of Drawing. In 1964, he was elected into the National Academy of Design as an Associate Academician.

1954 September
"My Enemy …My Love"
illustrated by Al Parker

1954 September
"Something to Love"
Illustrated by Austin Briggs

Austin Briggs (1908 – 1973) was a cartoonist and illustrator, Born in Humboldt, Minnesota, he grew up in Detroit, Michigan before moving to New York City as a teenager. After working for a while at an advertising agency, he began providing illustrations for the "upmarket" pulp magazine Blue Book.

Briggs later became an assistant to the cartoonist Alex Raymond on Flash Gordon and succeeded him on Secret Agent Corrigan. In 1940 he drew a Flash Gordon Daily strip which he stayed on until about 1944; he moved on to creating illustrations for books and magazines such as Readers Digest and The Saturday Evening Post. He was one of the founding faculty for the Famous Artists School. In 1969 he was elected to the Society of Illustrators’ Hall of Fame.

1954 September
"The Swan"
Illustrated by Al Parker

1954 September
"Where Angels Fear to Tread"
Illustrated by Al Parker

1955 September
"Marriage is for Two"
Illustration by Lucia Larner

1955 Cover
(Giselle MacKenzie)
Cover by Jon Whitcomb

1956 June
(illustrator not found)

1956 August
"The thing was her feet were loose"
illustrated by Phil Hayes

Philip Harrison "Phil" Hays (1931–2005) was an American illustrator. Born in Sherman, Texas, Hays grew up in Louisiana, served in the Air Force and in 1952 enrolled at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena. After graduating in 1955, Hays moved to New York. Almost overnight he became a top illustrator creating romantic illustrations for magazines like Seventeen, Cosmopolitan, Redbook and McCalls.

In 1957 Silas Rhodes invited him to teach at the young School of Visual Arts, and Hays did, soon becoming head of the illustration program. In 1978 Hays accepted an invitation from Art Center College of Design to head their illustration program and moved back to California. Hays died in October 2005.Five years later, he was awarded with New York ADC Hall of Fame.

1956 August
(Liz Taylor)Cover by Jon Whitcomb

1956 November
"And the truth wasn't in him"
Illustrated by Phil Hays

1956 November
Illustrated by Alex Ross

Alexander Sharpe Ross (1908-1990) born in Dunfermline, Scotland, moved with his family to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 1911. After attending Carnegie Tech Ross moved to New York and joined the Charles E. Cooper Studio, where he worked among such notable illustrators as Ward Brackett, Stevan Dohanos, J. Frederick Smith, and Jon Whitcomb.

Good Housekeeping magazine frequently featured Ross's artwork on their covers throughout the 1940s, while Ross was also completing commissions for some of the most popular magazines of the day, including The Saturday Evening Post, Cosmopolitan, McCall's, Collier's, Woman's Home Companion, and Reader's Digest. During the decline of magazine illustration in the mid-1960s, Ross turned from romantic magazine illustrations to fine art using watercolour, for which he won many awards