Henry R. Luce, age three, ca. 1901.
Henry Robinson Luce was born one-hundred-and-twenty years ago, on April 3, 1898, in China to American Presbyterian missionaries. Apart from a visit to the United States in 1906, young Henry spent his first fourteen years living in China, a time of momentous upheavals. While attending Chefoo, a British preparatory school in northern China, the 1911 Revolution ended the rule of the Qing dynasty, leading to the creation of a Republic. As a result, Chinese servants working at the school demanded that the administration double their salaries and when this was refused, quit en masse. This forced the students to pitch in with Luce proudly writing to his parents “I have been a tea-server and a dish-washer! — noble pursuit!”
In 1912 the fourteen-year-old Luce departed China to attend school in England to get rid of his stammer. Although happy to finally be leaving Chefoo, he was also leaving the place of his birth, writing “I am now almost on the verge of another precipice; one was leaving home, another is the leaving of a homeland.” The journey took him through Asia and the Mediterranean, with lots of stops along the way. After a brief length of study and additional solitary travel around Europe, he arrived in the United States and enrolled in Hotchkiss, a preparatory boarding school in Connecticut.
Luce’s Chefoo report card, 1904.
Luce’s letter to his sister sent from Sri Lanka with leaves taken from Singapore, November 22, 1912.
As scholarship student, Luce had to work while attending Hotchkiss, in addition to his studies and various extracurricular activities. One of his classmates at the school was Briton Hadden; the two became literary rivals and later, business partners. At this time Luce had also began thinking about his career prospects, writing to his father in 1914
During the summer of 1916, immediately prior to his entrance to Yale University, Luce got a job at the newspaper the Springfield Republican, his first foray into journalism outside of school. Excited to finally be “a workman” Luce hurriedly tore open his first pay envelope, containing $5.34, in his eagerness tearing the five dollar bill. Luce began to see a journalistic career in his future, writing on the cusp of his freshman year:
Luce’s Hotchkiss School Physical Training Department card, ca. 1913-1915.
Luce’s ROTC card, August 9, 1918.
World War I briefly interrupted Luce’s studies. As a member of the ROTC he was sent to drill new recruits in South Carolina. The war ended before he had a chance to be deployed and Luce was discharged at the end of 1918 with a rank of Second Lieutenant.
Luce’s letter to his father discussing the idea for the new publication, 1922.
Following his graduation in 1920, Luce studied history at Oxford University before embarking on a career path. Briefly working as a cub reporter at the Chicago Daily News and then the Baltimore News, Luce quit in 1922 and together with Briton Hadden moved to New York where the duo created the company Time Inc, publishing the first issue of their newly invented “news-magazine” TIME in 1923. The same year Luce married Lila Ross Hotz, the couple having two sons: Henry Luce III in 1925 and Peter Paul Luce in 1928.
Henry and Clare Luce. ca. 1934-1940.
Following Briton Hadden’s death in 1929, Luce became the sole head of Time Inc., launching additional ventures throughout the 1930s, including FORTUNE in 1930 , THE MARCH OF TIME radio series in 1931 (and short film series in 1935), and LIFE in 1936. He divorced Lila Hotz in 1935, marrying Clare Boothe Brokaw (1903-1987), a playwright, and former managing editor of Vanity Fair. Famous in her own right, the two became a power couple frequently appearing in the pages of the press.
With Luce’s greater visibility and the popularity of his magazines, the man in charge of Time Inc. was inundated with letters of complaint, praise, ideas, suggestions, requests for contributions and an opportunity to work for Luce. Responses to the myriad of letters sometimes required great tact and patience on the part of Luce and his senior staff.
Telegram from Harry M. Warner congratulating Luce, December 22, 1938.
Letter from Robert Moses requesting a job for his daughter, October 5, 1938.
Letter from Herbert H. Lehman to Luce, May 15, 1939.
Letter from Prince Ferdinand of Liechtenstein, November 29, 1940.
Luce in China, 1941.
An admitted workaholic, Luce spent a major portion of his time trying to ensure the success of his various publications but as he became more and more prominent in the 1930s, he was frequently invited to speak before professional, academic, and church groups. In addition his travels became more extensive with almost every year taking him to an international destination. In 1932 he traveled around the world, visiting China for the first time in 20 years and taking the Trans-Siberian Railroad on his way back to Europe. A growing interest in the political situation in Europe found him in Belgium in 1940, witnessing the initial Germany bombardment of Brussels. In 1941, together with Clare Boothe Luce, he traveled to the besieged city of Chungking, China to witness firsthand the Japanese war in Asia.
Letter to Luce from Albert Lee regarding the Chinese Exclusion Act, February 13, 1943.
Once back in the United States, Luce, always an advocate for the land of his birth, redoubled his efforts in support of China, serving as one of the driving forces behind the unification of the various disparate aid groups into United China Relief, an organization which raised millions of dollars to assist China. Luce also joined in the lobbying efforts to repeal the Chinese Exclusion Act
Luce also became an advocate for aid to Great Britain, which was in danger of being overwhelmed by Germany after defeat of France. As part of the Century Group, a consortium of prominent individuals, he lobbied President Roosevelt to assist Britain by providing it with old American destroyers.
Broadside from the Committee to Defend America by Aiding the Allies, ca. 1940.
Luce envisioned an expanded global role for the United States after the conclusion of the war and began to elaborate on that vision in a number of speeches he made in late 1940-early 1941. His ideas culminated in the article he wrote in LIFE, “The American Century.” Luce was now an international figure and increasingly came in contact with world leaders and dignitaries. Jan Smuts, Prime Minister of South Africa, wrote Luce:
Letter from Jan Smuts to Luce, August 14, 1942.
Luce’s increased involvement in international affairs coincided with a similar effort within domestic politics. In 1940 he successfully worked for the nomination of Wendell Willkie on the Republican ticket only to see him utterly defeated by Roosevelt. By the 1940s the relationship between Luce and Roosevelt had become antagonistic, not helped by the fact that Clare Boothe Luce, elected to the U.S. Congress in 1941, was a persistent critic of the administration. Possibly looking to spite Luce, publishers, editors and other executives were forbidden from traveling to the front, preventing Luce from going anywhere except England until the death of FDR in 1945.
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Broadside from the 1940 presidential election.
Broadside from the 1940 presidential election.
In 1943 Luce took a brief pause to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Time Inc. The previous two decades had been so hectic that Luce admitted that he had gotten out of habit of reminiscing:
Official Pass, V-E Day Ceremonies, Central Park Mall, 1945.
With the end of the war Luce was once more free to travel, quickly making up for lost time. Allen Grover, Luce’s personal assistant and sometime traveling companion knew full well frenzied schedules these trips entailed, describing one such trip: “We saw everyone of any account politically in six countries, not to mention de Gaulle and the Pope. At the end Harry had gained six pounds and I had lost ten.”
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Note from Charles de Gaulle, ca. 1949.
Luce with Pope Pius XII, 1956.
In Munich, Luce ended up walking around the city with a German professor who kept repeating “Free enterprise! Free enterprise! Free enterprise! – that is the only hope.” Twenty years later, Ludwig Erhard, now Chancellor of West Germany, said that talking to Luce had encouraged him to press on with his ideas of a market economy.
Letter from Ludwig Erhard to Luce, March 16, 1954.
Luce with Ludwig Erhard, 1965.
Luce awarding Anna Magnani the Oscar for best actress, Rome, 1957.
Luce was an early proponent of Dwight D. Eisenhower’s presidency in the 1952 presidential election and following Eisenhower’s victory, Clare Boothe Luce was appointed to serve as Ambassador to Italy. Luce followed his wife to Rome where he established an office, splitting his time between Europe and the United States between 1953-1956.
Letter from Stuart Scheftel to Luce regarding Sports Illustrated, March 2, 1938.
While shuffling between Italy and the United States Luce lunched his last big publishing venture: SPORTS ILLUSTRATED. In 1938 Luce had recommended its publisher, Stuart Scheftel, to cease publication that journal and was now able to buy the name for the newest addition to Time Inc.
Luce entered the 1960s with a hope for the future. Speaking before a group of Time Inc. staff after another of his round the world trips he encouraged the grumblers “I know there’s been some dissatisfaction, in the economic sense, with the Sixties so far — they are not so soaring. I have no doubt that the Sixties will be the Soaring Sixties. They may soar into tragedy, but certainly they will soar.”
A long time proponent of civil rights, Luce embraced the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960 writing in a memo to his senior staff “My conclusion is that in 1960 we should concentrate our editorial advocacy on Voting Rights. To prevent any citizen from voting comes as close as anything can to the violation of an Absolute in the democratic doctrine. … The ballot box is not a device whose efficacy has been revealed to us by Divine Revelation. But over the centuries, and as the result of the highest philosophy and of trial –and-error, the ballot box has become the Ark of the Covenant of Democracy and of Liberty itself as established through democratic procedures. It must not be profaned.”
Luce with Jackie Robinson, ca. 1945-1960.
Letter from William H. Kittrell to Luce regarding an article on Emmett Till, October 17, 1955.
Luce memorial services at the Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church, 1967.
In 1963 Luce celebrated the 40th anniversary of Time Inc. with a massive party attended by hundreds of prominent individuals and those who have graced the pages of its publications. The following year he retired, passing on his mantle to Hadley Donovan. For the next three years of his life Luce remained active, continuing to travel, make speeches, and keeping abreast of things happening at Time Inc. He died on February 28, 1967 in Phoenix, Arizona, one day following the 44th anniversary of the first issue of TIME coming off the presses in New York.
Luce with Bob Hope, 1961.
The Henry R. Luce papers, consisting of over 200 boxes of various sizes, have now been processed and a finding aid is available. The collection includes personal family correspondence sent by Luce while studying in Chefoo, Hotchkiss, and Yale; Luce’s voluminous trip files; original drafts of speeches written for Wendell Willkie during the 1940 presidential campaign; a large set of photographs; a large volume of correspondence from publishers, members of the clergy, politicians, businessmen, editors, journalists, ambassadors, generals, missionaries, actors, artists, and university presidents, among others; and lots of other interesting materials documenting the middle of the 20th century.
[All images are from the Henry R. Luce Papers, MS 3014, New-York Historical Society.]
This post is by Alex Gelfand, Project Archivist, Henry R. Luce Papers. Processing of the Henry R. Luce Papers is made possible through the generous support of the Henry Luce Foundation.
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