On November 23, 1936, the first issue of the pictorial magazine
Life was published, featuring a cover photo of the Fort Peck
Dam’s spillway by Margaret Bourke-White.
Life actually had its start earlier in the 20th century as a different
kind of magazine: a weekly humor publication, not unlike today’s
The New Yorker in its use of tart cartoons, humorous pieces and
cultural reporting.
When the original Life folded during the Great Depression, the
influential American publisher Henry Luce bought the name
and re-launched the magazine as a picture-based periodical.
Henry Robinson Luce
(April 3, 1898 – February 28, 1967)
A look inside that first issue of LIFE.
