Misplaced Pages

#28971

117-501: Time-Life, Inc. was founded in 1961 as the book marketing subsidiary of the New York City-based Time Inc. , the later, around 1966, coined Time & Life, Inc. (note use of different connecting characters between "Time" and "Life") and took its name from Time Inc.'s two then-flagship magazines, Time and Life . It remained independent from both however, even though the company could in the beginning draw on

234-515: A Grammy Award for Best Bluegrass Album also in 2011, Joan Osborne's Bring it on Home which was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Blues Album in 2013, and The Beatles' "First Recordings: 50th Anniversary Edition" which was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Album Notes in the same year. Saguaro Roads Records though, was excluded from the deal when RDA had to sell Time Life to Mosaic Media Investment Partners in 2013, but has remained dormant ever since. The following list shows many of

351-658: A Grammy Award for Best Traditional Gospel Album complemented with a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award for their Live in New Orleans video registration, Patti LuPone 's Gypsy : The 2008 Broadway Cast Recording which was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album that year, Hank Williams: The Complete Mother's Best Recordings which was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Historical Album in 2011, Patty Loveless's Mountain Soul II which won

468-465: A "magazine group" in 1985 (under Kelso F. Sutton to 1986,and then Reginald K. Brack Jr.) and then became president and CEO of a newly incorporated subsidiary,"The Time Inc. Magazine Company" in 1988 (initially with John A. Meyers as chairman). In 1992, Time Warner reorganized so that the non-magazine parts of Time Inc. came directly under the parent and the Time Inc. name was downgraded to only include

585-571: A $ 100,000 goal, the first issue of Time was published on March 3, 1923, as the first weekly news magazine in the United States. Luce served as business manager while Hadden was editor-in-chief. Luce and Hadden annually alternated year-to-year the titles of president and secretary-treasurer. Upon Hadden's sudden death in 1929, Luce assumed Hadden's position. Luce launched the business magazine Fortune in February 1930 and created/founded

702-549: A 2001 US$ 20 million net operating profit into a net operating loss of US$ 50 million in 2003. Direct Holdings sold music and video products under the Time Life brand, and was also the holding company of the StarVista LIVE L.L.C. experience entertainment property, thereby becoming responsible for Time Life's entry into that industry in the 2003-13 time period. In March 2007, Ripplewood led a group that acquired and privatized

819-531: A few TV shows in 2014 and 2015, the company formed Time Inc. Productions in 2016 as its in-house production company. On February 11, 2016, Time Inc. announced that it has acquired Viant, a leading people based marketing platform and owner of MySpace . With the purchase of Time Warner by AT&T, it was agreed that Time Warner television assets such as HBO also came under the AT&;T umbrella; after WarnerMedia spun off from AT&T in 2021, these assets came under

936-614: A local branch and not by the American mother company; the 1986–89 book series Australians at War was initiated by the local Australasian subsidiary, "Time-Life Books (Australia) Pty Ltd." – located at 15 Blue Street, North Sydney, N.S.W. 2060, Australia at the time, according to the volume colophons of the series – and therefore relatively rare on American/European soil. Prior to Time-Life, Inc.'s decision to relocate its headquarters from Chicago to Fairfax, Virginia in late 1986, it had long before that already decided to split off

1053-457: A mass-market mail order book club/retailer of which there were several in the era, most conspicuously that of contemporary competitor Reader's Digest . On the first volume in the 1966–70 Library of Art series (the eighth one Time-Life took in production at the time) for example, American artist Rockwell Kent commented, "It would be hard for me to overstate my delight in "The World of Michelangelo" – not merely for its superb reproductions of

1170-754: A new building, also in Rockefeller Center , 1271 Avenue of the Americas . Time rented additional offices in the adjacent 135 West 50th Street building. In 2014, Time moved to Brookfield Place in lower Manhattan . When they were being built, both the Rockefeller Plaza and Avenue of the Americas buildings were given the name "Time & Life Building" at the time after their main soon-to-be tenant, but also lost it when that tenant moved elsewhere. This incidentally, did not apply to their 153 New Bond Street, London W1Y0AA UK premises; it too

1287-517: A nigh next-door neighbor eventually of its mother company after 1986, and where it stayed until it was vacated in 2004. Contemporary reporters though, had a tough time keeping both premises apart, as they kept confusing one for the other. Time-Life Books' DTC business model started to slump around 1991. Then-Deputy Editor Harris Andrews recalled how distraught he got when his 1991 Echoes of Glory mini-series project did not do well in DTC sales. However, once

SECTION 10

#1732791831029

1404-426: A particular year (in this case, 1955 through 1964—the early, pre-Beatles years of rock music), a stylistic trend or particular artist influential in rock music. Each volume had 22 tracks, and was said to contain the original hit recording by the original artist (although this wasn't always true on early pressings of the early albums in the series). The songs themselves represented the most important and popular songs from

1521-475: A publicly traded company. Time Warner 's chairman/CEO Jeff Bewkes said that the split would allow Time Warner to focus entirely on its television and film businesses, and Time Inc. to focus on its core print media businesses. It was announced in May 2014 that Time Inc. would become a publicly traded company on June 6 of that year. The spin-off was completed on June 9, 2014. As of September 13, 2016, Rich Battista

1638-426: A scrolling list of other titles), a commercial spokesman (usually a performer or legendary disc jockey relevant to a given series, such as Rick Dees for a 1970s-intensive collection and Ralph Emery for a country music series) and testimonials from customers attesting to the quality and value of the albums, to pitch a given series. Key selling points of these collections are that each track was digitally transferred to

1755-755: A sizable discount from their list prices. Often, the books sold are editions created specifically for sale by the clubs, and are manufactured more cheaply and less durably than the regular editions. The Book-of-the-Month Club (founded 1926) is an early and well known example of this kind of business. Others include the Science Fiction Book Club, the Mystery Book Club, and the Quality Paperback Book Club, all of which are run by Booksonline / Doubleday Entertainment (a subsidiary of Bookspan ). The largest book of

1872-491: A sturdy box set. After Walter Wanger 's death in 1968, its Time Life Films subsidiary also acquired his production company Walter Wanger Productions and many of its films. When record labels were no longer producing vinyl albums in 1990, Time Life transitioned to CD. In the mid-1990s, Time Life acquired Heartland Music, with the Heartland Music label then appearing as a brand. This company was subsequently sold off and

1989-1175: A toll-free number for assistance and the Time-Life infomercial channel has been pulled from all cable services, before it went permanently dark altogether. In 2008, Reader's Digest Association (RDA) launched Saguaro Roads Records, Inc. as an in-house music recording label, and resorted it under Time Life due to its 2007 subordination under RDA by their then-owner Ripplewood. Under the combined "Time Life/Saguaro Roads Records" label, albums have been released with Adam Hood , Blind Boys of Alabama , Bo Bice , Brandy and Ray J , Collin Raye , Dion , Edwin McCain , Hank Williams (estate), Jim Brickman , Joan Osborne , Lonestar , Marc Cohn , Mark Chesnutt , Patty Loveless , Rebecca Lynn Howard , Tanya Tucker , The Grascals , Angie Stone , Waylon Jennings and Don McLean . Since its launch Saguaro Roads Records has had garnered seven Grammy nominations for its releases. These included two 2009 releases from The Blind Boys of Alabama whose Down in New Orleans album won

2106-516: A variety of reasons. The Dutch language versions of History of the World (as "Time Life Wereld Geschiedenis"), The Epic of Flight (as "De Geschiedenis van de Luchtvaart"), The Enchanted World (as "Het Rijk der Fabelen"), and Mysteries of the Unknown (no Dutch series title) series, for example, were shy of four, seven, eight, and a whopping twenty-five volumes in translation respectively. Likewise,

2223-425: Is no longer associated with Time Life. On December 31, 2003, Time Life was sold by Time Warner to a group of private investors including Ripplewood Holdings L.L.C. and ZelnickMedia for an undisclosed price, who subordinated their acquisition under their jointly-owned, Direct Holdings Global L.L.C. holding company, founded in 1998. With that transaction, Direct Holdings US Corp became the legal name of Time-Life which

2340-505: Is sent until the customer specifically orders them. The offer of a free book, often a large one, is a frequent enticement to membership. The Compact Edition of the Oxford English Dictionary for years served this purpose. Some clubs offer new members other (non-book) free gifts, such as book notes or reading lights. Some book sales clubs are "continuity" clubs, which send members a certain number of books (selected by

2457-796: The Hachette Book Group since its 2006 acquisition by Hachette Livre ) for $ 17 million in January 1968. Time Inc. also owned pioneering cable network Home Box Office (HBO). In 1974, Time Inc. launched the celebrity-focused magazine People . In February 1985, Time Inc. announced that it would acquire the Birmingham, Alabama -based Southern Progress Corporation, publishers of the Southern Living magazine for $ 480 million. In 1987, Time Inc. and Robin Wolaner launched

SECTION 20

#1732791831029

2574-939: The Reader's Digest Association (RDA) in the process agreeing to make Direct Holdings, and thus Time-Life, a subsidiary of RDA. In addition to the company's film and music core activities, it was also the holding company of television and radio combo stations. Stations the company owned were KLZ-TV - AM - FM in Denver , WFBM-TV - AM - FM in Indianapolis , WOOD-TV - AM in Grand Rapids, Michigan , KERO-TV in Bakersfield, California , and KOGO-TV - AM - FM in San Diego , many of which were sold to McGraw-Hill in 1972; however, Time Life kept WOOD-TV, which became WOTV after

2691-532: The Time Frame aka History of the World and Lost Civilizations series), the addition of more book series for children, while at the same time substantially stepping up their editorial focus on easier – and thus cheaper – to produce DIY-themed book series, they had already introduced in 1968 with their long-running 1968-77 Foods of the World cookbook series. The books though, regardless of their perceived quality, are easy to find at low prices on

2808-400: The 1960s and 1970s, the collections released by Time–Life Records catered to an adult audience, with genres including classical , jazz , swing and orchestral music; and the music of operas and Broadway theatre . On occasion, Time Life offered popular music (generally pre-1955 music, as opposed to pop and rock music airing on contemporary hit radio stations in the United States at

2925-422: The 1970s and 1980s, purchasing what was later spun off as Temple-Inland paper company and various broadcasting and cable television operations such as HBO and what became Time Warner Cable . As the distinction between the overall corporation and the magazine operation grew, the position that had been "Group Vice President, Magazines" or "Executive Vice President, Magazines" became president and chief executive of

3042-573: The Civil War followup project. This however, did not apply to latter-day non-proprietary book series Time-Life was licensed to market, such as the 1999-2000 The Civil War: A Narrative – 40th Anniversary Edition commemorative series edition, or the European series licensed from Andromeda Oxford, Ltd. (see below ) Time-Life ceased to publish books when it made its Time-Life Books, Inc. division defunct in January 2001, with any remaining vestiges of

3159-563: The Civil War" ( OCLC   1044896 ) book titles as spin-offs of their two flagship magazines. It was Time, Inc. itself however, that did initiate the publication of DTC book series in 1960 with their long running 1960-67 LIFE World Library series, before it was two years later placed into the care of its newly established subsidiary. After having tested the waters with the tentative 1960–61 trade paperback Time Capsule budget-priced book series publishing trial run (which actually evolved into their 1962-1966 Time Reading Program series,

3276-1274: The Companion Book Club, the Sportsman's Book Club, the Science Fiction Book Club, the History Book Club, the Victorian and Modern History Book Club, the Catholic Book Club, the Garden Book Club, the Thriller Book Club, and the Folio Society . In 19th-century Britain, the term book club was sometimes applied to text publication societies . Like the modern clubs, these were membership organizations whose members would receive publications automatically in return for their subscriptions. The books were usually scholarly editions of old works of historical or literary interest, or of archival records , which had been edited and published specifically (and often exclusively) for distribution to society members. The oldest of these societies

3393-567: The Fairfax premises open as the non-print Time-Life seat until the altogether shuttering of the company in 2023. The from 2004 onward unrelated Time [& Life], Inc./Time Warner however, continued until the late-2010s to publish similar print material for the home market through New York City-based Time Home Entertainment, Inc. (founded in the early 1990s), but as publisher of retail single-title books only instead of (direct marketed) book series, which they themselves had already scrubbed entirely in

3510-730: The German-language version of The Old West (as "Der Wilde Westen," and, even though American specific, translated nonetheless due to the continued and unabated popularity of the Western genre in Germany), disseminated through the Amsterdam branch as Time-Life Bücher, was shy of seven volumes just like the French-language Le Far West edition was. Of at least one series is known that it had been initiated by

3627-461: The Time Warner board, and formally by Ripp in 2013). McManus left the board of what had become Time Warner shortly before retiring, and his replacement Norman Pearlstine and successors John Huey (2006–2012) and Martha Nelson (2013) were never directors of the parent. The title was then abolished. Linen became chairman of the executive committee for a time after serving as president, then

Time Life - Misplaced Pages Continue

3744-629: The Time acquisition and the lawsuit, and allowing the formation of the two companies' merger which was completed on January 10, 1990. Effectively, Time took over Warner, resulting in a new corporate structure and the new combined company being called "Time Warner". In November 1990, Time Inc. announced that it would acquire the remaining stake in Hippocrates Partners (Time earlier purchased its 50% stake in July 1988). The Pathfinder website

3861-452: The UK magazine house Time Inc. UK (which was later sold and since has been rebranded to TI Media ), whose major titles include What's on TV , NME , Country Life , and Wallpaper . Time Inc. also co-operated over 60 websites and digital-only titles including MyRecipes , Extra Crispy , TheSnug , HelloGiggles , and MIMI . In 1990, Time Inc. merged with Warner Communications to form

3978-561: The US home market, usually, but not always, under its own imprint. English-language versions of British Commonwealth-pedigree series were published by a variety of publishers for the various English-speaking territories in the world, with the regional Time-Life Books B.V. Amsterdam subsidiary commonly designated for Europe and the British Isles, as mentioned in the colophons of the individual volumes. The Amsterdam subsidiary also took care of

4095-726: The World series, the UK variant of the home market Time Frame series where it had been a common volume. Nor was this phenomenon restricted to the English-language volume releases alone; of the "Gemstones" volume of the Planet Earth series, which had been a common one for the source release, is known that its "Edelgesteenten" Dutch-language counterpart ( ISBN   906182494X ) had been the rare one, still commanding premium prices on Dutch/Belgian used-book markets for its extreme scarcity. Non-USA-specific topic series were habitually translated into other languages (French being

4212-621: The board in 2017 and John Fahey served as non-executive chairman for the months prior to the company's sale to Meredith. On May 28, 2015, Time Inc. announced the purchase of entertainment and sports news site FanSided . In July 2015, Time Inc. acquired League Athletics in Tucson , SportsSignup in Saratoga Springs , and iScore in Los Alamitos . The three companies will be a part of Sports Illustrated Play. After attempting

4329-455: The book business, it had the already near-empty Alexandria office premises vacated in 2004 after its acquisition of Time Life, laying off what was left of the former Time-Life Books, Inc. staff, outsourcing remaining operations like customer service, order processing and distribution to third-party companies in Iowa, Pennsylvania and Kentucky instead. It did keep the Fairfax premises open however, as

4446-516: The book colophons. Time Life added music in 1967, selling box sets and collections through Time–Life Records as a division subordinated under Time-Life Books, Inc. The division changed its name to Time Life Music after music cassette tapes were added to its array of releases, with its European iterations, including the German Time Life Musik label, subordinated under the Amsterdam "Time-Life Books BV" subsidiary branch. During

4563-538: The book division immediately terminated for good upon the 31 December 2003 acquisition by Ripplewood/Direct Holdings L.L.C. The European "Time Life Books B.V." Amsterdam subsidiary branch and its three satellite offices elsewhere in Europe though, held out for a few years longer before they too were all closed down simultaneously in late August 2009, after which all remaining book publishing activities were suspended indefinitely. Despite Ripplewood's stated intent to return to

4680-414: The book division onto its own entity in 1964, as above stated, in order to better differentiate between their book and the non-print media activities. Time-Life Books, Inc. had in the meantime moved out its New York City premises (where it was left behind by its mother company when they moved to Chicago in 1969) a decade earlier in early 1977 to the nearby 2000 Duke St. Alexandria, VA 22314 premises, to become

4797-422: The book publishing business that combined the resources of their magazines with the formation of Time Life (it later became the holding company for television and radio stations and had a film production division, Time Life Films and a record label). Time Inc. later acquired Boston -based Little, Brown and Company (later integrated into Time Warner Book Group following its merger with Warner Books, now known as

Time Life - Misplaced Pages Continue

4914-422: The brand logo of their former book subsidiary on their own single-title book publications again after 2013, it (the brand, not the subsidiary) had quietly bought back from Mosaic Media Investment Partners in January 2014. Having been renamed "Time Inc. Books" in 2015, the publisher shared its mother company's fate when it went ultimately defunct in 2018, bringing the era of Time-Life Books to a definitive end. While

5031-667: The cities were properly zoned,' he recalls. 'I went to the Post Office Department and showed them how we were making the zone system work. ' " In 1963, the United States Post Office introduced ZIP codes . Luce, who remained editor-in-chief of all his publications until 1964, maintained a position as an influential member of the Republican Party . Holding anti-communist sentiments, he used Time to support right-wing dictatorships in

5148-461: The club or the member) every month until the membership expires or is cancelled. Harlequin Book Clubs are typical of such clubs. Other book sales clubs are "commitment" clubs, which require members to order a certain number of books in order to fulfill the membership obligation and cancel the membership. Most Book-of-the-Month Clubs are commitment clubs. Book sales clubs typically sell books at

5265-506: The collections the company has released, but is by no means exhaustive. Time Life's video business has been growing quickly since 2000. Starting out at the dawn of the VHS era in 1978, the division began with (re-)issuing such documentary series as The World at War (1973–74), The Trials of Life (1990), The Civil War (1990), The Wild West (1993), The Nazis: A Warning from History (1997), and Growing Up Wild (2012). As evidenced by

5382-443: The company and its only official online retailer were permanently shut down by its last owner, though the one remaining official website only went dark in May 2024. As Time-Life Books, Inc. – which was not formally incorporated as an official subsidiary until 1964 – the company gained fame as a seller of book series that were directly mailed to households in (bi-)monthly installments, operating as book sales clubs , which

5499-479: The company in 2005. Leaders after Moore are noted above. Book sales club A book sales club is a subscription -based method of selling and purchasing books . It is more often called simply a book club , a term that is also used to describe a book discussion club , which can cause confusion. Each member of a book sales club agrees to receive books by mail and pay for them as they are received. This may be done by means of negative option billing , in which

5616-412: The customer receives an announcement of the book, or books, along with a form to notify the seller if the customer does not want the book: if the customer fails to return the form by a specified date, the seller will ship the book and expect the customer to pay for it. Alternatively, the business may operate via a "positive option", in which the customer is periodically sent a list of books offered, but none

5733-669: The desired format using the original master recordings, as opposed to being "re-records"; and that the most popular and requested songs by customers could be found in a single collection (as opposed to a customer having to purchase many albums to obtain just a few desired tracks). Customers were given a choice of which format they wanted their box set: either vinyl albums (through 1990), 8-track or cassette tape , or compact disc ; today's box sets are offered only as compact discs. While most of Time Life's box-sets and releases were critically hailed, there were also some minor faults pointed out by critics. For instance, several early pressings of

5850-690: The early volumes in "The Rock'n'Roll Era" series contained stereo re-recordings of the original hits (something that would be corrected on later pressings, either with the correct original recording or a replacement track). Sometimes, the most popular songs of a given time period were omitted, frequently due to licensing issues. Examples included The Beatles and The Rolling Stones for the Classic Rock and "Super Hits"/"AM Gold" series;, Garth Brooks and Shania Twain on various country music series;, and Prince , Madonna , Whitney Houston , Guns N' Roses , Bon Jovi , Janet Jackson and Michael Jackson on

5967-553: The early-1980s and located at the time at Ottho Heldringstraat 5, 1066 AZ Amsterdam , Netherlands ) as headquarters for mainland Europe and the British isles, which maintained administrative satellite offices in Paris ( France ), London ( UK ), and Munich ( Germany ), not by coincidence all located in the countries where Time-Life Books took on the publisher role itself. However, not rarely were these translated versions truncated for

SECTION 50

#1732791831029

6084-850: The editorial services of both for their early 1960s book series, particularly where pictorial content was concerned. The subsidiary moved out of the New York City premises to its own headquarters in Chicago, USA after that building had finished construction in 1969 (though it had left the book division at New York for the editorial convenience of having the Time and Life pictorial archives nearby), before it relocated back east again to 8280 Willow Oaks Corporate Drive, Fairfax, VA 22031 in 1986 where it remained until its ultimate demise in 2023. Starting in 1967, Time Life combined its book offerings with music collections (two to five records) and packaged them as

6201-462: The feuds Chambers had with reporters in the field. In the 1950s, the Time Inc. executive Brumbaugh made presentations to the Post Office Department to explain how Time Inc. was using a zoning system to speed the delivery of its magazines. Although the Post Office Department had instigated zones in 1943, they were inconsistently applied. As cited in FYI, Time Inc.'s internal newsletter " 'Fewer than 40% of

6318-404: The first years of its existence after Time & Life had shortly before relocated from its previous premises in Rockefeller Center in 1960. In 2014 it relocated again to smaller premises elsewhere in the city. As a brand, Time-Life actually outlived its sire by five years, as the remnants of Time & Life went defunct in early 2018 after a steady three-decades long decline (mirroring in effect

6435-858: The first, second and penultimate titles, Time Life Video had over its lifespan been the distributor of choice of British broadcasters, the BBC in particular, for the dissemination of their documentaries on home video formats in the US market. Time Life subsequently branched out into nostalgic television shows as well at more recent times, having been able to leverage their already music industry knowledge and contacts to release television shows previously held back because of expensive music rights clearances. Their collections were known for having extensive bonus features, liner notes and packaging. Television show releases from Time Life include: Time Inc. Time, Inc. (also referred to as Time & Life, Inc. later on, after their two onetime flagship magazine publications)

6552-404: The fold of Warner Bros. Discovery . In February 2017, it was reported that Meredith Corporation and a group of investors led by Edgar Bronfman Jr. were considering purchasing Time Inc. In 2016, Time Inc. acquired Bizrate Insights . On April 28, 2017, the company's board of directors dropped the plan of selling the company and instead focus on growth strategies. On November 26, 2017, it

6669-429: The format of their choice); customers and had the option of keeping just the volumes they wanted. In time, each volume was also offered for individual sale. Several of the series – especially the pop, rock, country and rhythm and blues series – had retail versions for sale, released after the entire series was issued. Typically, these were sold at discount stores, often grouped in three-CD sets of 12 tracks each and having

6786-420: The fourteen-volume "40th Anniversary Edition" The Civil War: A Narrative and the eighteen-volume Voices of the Civil War series, where the volumes "Petersburg Siege to Bentonville" ( ISBN   0783501129 ) and "Shenandoah 1864" ( ISBN   078354717X ) were the rarer ones respectively. The same applied for "The Rise of Cities" volume ( ISBN   0705409910 ) from the twenty five-volume History of

6903-423: The magazine company, so the officers of the "Magazine Company" became the officers of what was now Time Inc. Later that year, CEO Brack shifted to chairman with Don Logan as president; he stepped down in favor of Logan as CEO in 1994 and chairman in 1997. Logan moved up to a group oversight position including additional Time Warner operations in 2002 ( Ann S. Moore succeeding him at the magazine operation) and left

7020-496: The magazine in 2000) In 2008, Time Inc. launched Maghound , an internet-based magazine membership service that featured approximately 300 magazine titles from both Time Inc. brands and external publishing companies. On January 19, 2010, Time Inc. acquired StyleFeeder, a personal shopping engine. In August 2010, Time Inc. announced that Ann S. Moore , its chairman and chief executive, would step down as CEO and be replaced by Jack Griffin , an executive with Meredith Corporation ,

7137-577: The main Sounds of the Eighties series. Time Life Music too, was included in the December 31, 2003 sale of Time Life, Inc. to Direct Holdings Global, the former Time Warner owners having cited the "earnings drag of the direct-marketing music division" caused by the "challenging publishing environment where sales have suffered from a lack of hits and the downturn in the music business" as the reason to have

SECTION 60

#1732791831029

7254-411: The main book series had been. Yet, Time-Life Books was still able to sell 20 million books in 1985, which, at a US$ 260 million turnover that year (after having suffered a disastrous sales plunge to a mere US$ 1,6 million two years earlier), made the subsidiary the largest single earning component of Time-Life, Inc. at that particular point in time – though it had to lay off over 200 employees (out of

7371-477: The master’s work but for the textual and pictorial presentation." Other examples standing out for their perceived picture/text quality included the 1970-72 LIFE Library of Photography series which featured for its time very high-quality duotone printing for its black-and-white reproductions in its original edition, having been able to draw on Life ' s own vast archive of journalistic and art photographs from virtually every major contemporary photographer (hence

7488-592: The media conglomerate Time Warner (now Warner Bros. Discovery ). In 2018, media company Meredith Corporation acquired Time Inc. for $ 2.8 billion. Meredith was then acquired by IAC and merged with Dotdash to form Dotdash Meredith three years later, thus resulting in IAC gaining most of the former Time Inc. assets. Nightly discussions of the concept of a news magazine led its founders Henry Luce and Briton Hadden , both age 23, to quit their jobs in 1922. Later that same year, they formed Time Inc. Having raised $ 86,000 of

7605-477: The mini-series became one of the very first to be also distributed through regular book store retail channels, sales picked up dramatically, thereby becoming a sales success after all. As a result, Time Life Books series, including the older ones that were still in print, were henceforth concurrently marketed through the regular book store channels as well, alongside the hitherto DTC-only channel – which incidentally, also encompassed Andrews' own 1996-98 Voices of

7722-456: The misfortunes of its erstwhile progeny), with its handful of surviving assets being broken up and sold piecemeal to a variety of third-party outsiders. In order to settle outstanding financial obligations pursuant their 2012 bankruptcy, Reader's Digest Association sold Time Life in 2013 to Mosaic Media Investment Partners. In 2023 and without so much as a whisper in contemporary media, Time-Life ended its six decades-long existence eventually, when

7839-793: The month clubs had millions of members. Time-Life book produced a large number of book series in the book sales club format, including the Time Reading Program . During the 20th century British book clubs included the Book Club, the Left Book Club , the Right Book Club , Collins Crime Club , Book Club Associates (BCA), The Reprint Society , the Readers' Union , the Travel Book Club, Others included

7956-431: The most popular of the series' tracks, and cover artwork and naming loosely based on the subscription/catalog-exclusive titles. Additionally, the "Classic Country" series had special 15-track single-CD versions of several of its volumes issued for retail sale (in addition to budget 3-CD sets). As of March 2023, Time Life began shutting down its DTC CD and DVD music service. Until May 2024, the company's website only listed

8073-499: The most predominant, due to Time Life's desire to have to bordering French-Canada served as well), and disseminated through local branches of Time-Life Books in the intended target markets. For several, usually smaller language areas, Time-Life regularly resorted to licensing out their publications to local publishers, as was for example the case with The Old West and The Enchanted World series. One major such licensee had been Barcelona, Spain-based Ediciones Folio, S.A. who for decades

8190-456: The name of fighting communism. An instrumental figure behind the so-called " China Lobby ", he played a large role in steering American foreign policy and popular sentiment in favor of Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek and his wife Soong Mei-ling in their war against the Japanese. (The Chiangs appeared in the cover of Time eleven times between 1927 and 1955. In 1961, Time Inc. entered

8307-467: The nation's second-largest publisher of consumer magazines. In September 2010, Time Inc. entered into a licensing agreement with Kolkata -based ABP Group , one of India's largest media conglomerates, to publish Fortune India magazine and the yearly Fortune India 500 list. Griffin was ousted after a brief tenure, eventually being replaced by Laura Lang, who served about a year. On March 6, 2013, Time Warner announced plans to spin off Time Inc. into

8424-432: The once highly successful division included in the sale as well. Through 2010, several different series Time Life had offered were available on a subscription basis, either by calling a 1-800 number or sending a completed postcard-sized card and payment to Time Life. Purportedly, the customer would get a specific volume (as advertised on TV or in a magazine) first, before receiving a new volume roughly every other month (on

8541-510: The ones covered in the late 1980s Understanding Computers and Voyage Through the Universe series which were already outdated before either series had even completed its run. Nor were their history series entirely exempt from this phenomenon either, especially the early 1960s ones, as new insights, archeological findings and new technology have the potential to completely rewrite history as understood in past decades. Mayan history for example,

8658-428: The only other known paperback book series the publisher released afterwards), the new subsidiary started out for real in 1962 with the 1960-67 LIFE World Library (the "Time" qualifier was only in 1966 added to the company's name and book logos, coinciding with the renaming of sire company "Time, Inc." to "Time & Life, Inc.") hardback series it had inherited from its mother company, with the hardback slated to become

8775-496: The parent-focused magazine Parenting (Time Inc. later purchased the remaining stake in the magazine held by Wolaner on January 5, 1990, several days before the completion of merger with Warner Communications) In 1987, Time Inc. lost its ownership stake in the USA Network , which it held since 1981, after attempting to acquire CNN . The merger of Time Inc. and Warner Communications was announced on March 4, 1989. During

8892-411: The period or subject featured. An essay published by Both Sides Now Publications noted that Time-Life's move into rock music came at a time when much of the adult audience Time-Life catered to grew up during the rock-and-roll era and, as such, the new series was consistent with its goal of catering to an adult audience. " The Rock 'n' Roll Era " series was a big success, and by the time the final volume

9009-481: The pictorial Life magazine in 1936, and launched House & Home in 1952 and Sports Illustrated in 1954. He also produced The March of Time radio and newsreel series. By the mid-1960s, Time Inc. was the largest and most prestigious magazine publisher in the world. ( Dwight Macdonald , a Fortune staffer during the 1930s, referred to him as "Il Luce", a play on the Italian dictator Benito Mussolini , who

9126-518: The plethora of later output as the publisher moved away from soberly presented science and history toward sensationalism (that then with new age overtones imbued trend started in the mid-1980s with The Enchanted World and Mysteries of the Unknown series, followed in the early 1990s by the Library of Curious and Unusual Facts and True Crime series as prime sensationalist examples), less academically but more popularized written history (such as

9243-414: The positions of president and secretary-treasurer. On Hadden's sudden death in 1929 Luce took his position and business management was entrusted to Roy E. Larsen , who had been one of their first hires. Luce cultivated a philosophy of "church and state", where the editorial and business management were separate up to the board of directors level. (This was functionally ended with the departure of McManus from

9360-549: The potential other-language editions in Europe. These European Time Life versions are far less common, if not outright rare, in used-book markets—the North American ones in particular—than Time Life's own proprietary releases are. The non-proprietary US home market releases on the other hand, are rare on European soil. Licensed series published under the Time-Life Books brand had the licensors dutifully mentioned in

9477-425: The preceding year, deeming them "too unprofitable". In essence, Time, Inc. emulated what former competitor Reader's Digest had been doing before them and what contemporary competitor National Geographic Books was still doing at that point in time, actually coming in more than one way full circle as they had done likewise themselves prior to their 1960 book series introduction. Somewhat confusingly, they began to employ

9594-524: The reader’s intelligence, and, therefore, more worthy of praise". The same held equally true for the slightly earlier 1963–64 The LIFE History of the United States series where each of the volumes was written by an American historian of contemporary renown. Because of their intrinsic transient nature in regard to validity, most science book series quickly became ephemera of their time only a short while later on, especially those concerning fields in which developments followed each other at breakneck speed, such as

9711-512: The sale of the other stations, and remained owned by the company until 1984. It was also the U.S. television distributor of programs from the BBC in the United Kingdom until Lionheart Television took over in 1982. Time-Life, Inc.'s progenitor company Time & Life, Inc. had remained throughout its entire existence headquartered in New York City. Its 1271 Avenue of the Americas location became Time-Life's nascent headquarters as well in

9828-422: The sciences, and (world civilization) histories, as well as an early series on contemporary life in various countries of the world. Content of all of these earlier series was somewhat academic in tone and presentation, providing the basics of the subjects in the way it might be done in a lecture aimed at the general public. One of the earliest such series concerned the 1965–68 Great Ages of Man history series, which

9945-540: The seat of its subsidiary Direct Holdings Global during their 2003–13 ownership of Time Life. In their post-August 2009 haste to quit the book publishing business as quickly as possible, Direct Holdings decided to liquidate their leftover book stock by dumping it wholesale on specialized US and European remainder book stores, which included relatively new, late-1990s, produced series like The Civil War: A Narrative – 40th Anniversary Edition or Myths and Mankind . Subsequent owner Mosaic Media Investment Partners too, kept

10062-599: The series temporary return to the "Life"-only title), remaining in print for over a decade besides spawning two spinoff photography series. In similar vein, the 1968–77 Foods Of The World series featured contributions by renowned contemporary food writers/critics and chefs such as M. F. K. Fisher , James Beard , Julia Child , Craig Claiborne , among others. The 1978–80 The Good Cook series, edited by Richard Olney , featured likewise contributions from Jeremiah Tower , fe Grigson, Michel Lemonnier, and many others. Other well regarded series covered nature, (urban) geography ,

10179-407: The songs, with the addition of placement on various Billboard magazine charts. Like the earlier box-sets featuring other musical styles and genres, the country and pop music series were advertised in magazines, catalogs and direct mail. By this time though, and like its Time-Life Books sibling division, most of these collections were advertised on television as well, vigorously so in effect. There

10296-473: The subsidiary's staple book release format. The by the general populace perceived cachet of the hardback format where quality of both format and contents were concerned, actually lined up fully with the intent of original publisher Jerome Hardy, who had declared early on that his publishing company would succeed through a strategy to "give the customer more than he has any right to expect." Several of these book series garnered substantial critical acclaim unusual for

10413-550: The summer of that same year, Paramount Communications (formerly Gulf and Western Industries ) launched a $ 12.2 billion hostile bid to acquire Time Inc. in an attempt to end a stock swap merger deal between Time and Warner Communications. This caused Time to raise its bid for Warner to $ 14.9 billion in cash and stock. Paramount responded by filing a lawsuit in a Delaware court to block the Time/Warner merger. The court ruled twice in favor of Time, forcing Paramount to drop both

10530-430: The time ( Charley Pride was the first artist featured) getting their own album. But until the mid-1980s, Time Life did not feature a rock music-intensive series for customers, preferring to cater to older adults with conservative music tastes. Time Life's first successful foray into rock music came in 1986, with a series called "The Rock 'n' Roll Era." Each volume in that series—like similar series that followed—focused on

10647-519: The time) in box-sets. Although there were television advertisements, Time Life advertised most of these sets in magazines, specialty catalogs and direct mail , just like it did with their book series. In the early 1980s, Time Life began branching out, offering a series of albums focusing on country music . The first series was 1981's "Country Music," with volumes focusing on a particular artist and featuring eight or nine tracks per album. Twenty volumes were issued, with many of country's greatest artists of

10764-565: The total 1,243 employee pool of 1983, spread over ten worldwide offices) and shutter the Mexico City (Time-Life International de Mexico S.A. de C.V.) and Tokyo , Japan (Time Life International Publishing) operations to turn around the dramatic net operating losses suffered earlier that decade, but which also heralded the beginning of Time-Life Books' gradual withdrawal from the Far Eastern and Latin-American markets. Of some series it

10881-412: The used-book market, due to their being published in millions of copies. The same incidentally, also applied for the handful of later stand-alone book titles the company had published that were not part of a series, such as the 1995 "Eyewitness: 150 years of photojournalism" ( ISBN   0848710223 ) title, but which were nonetheless usually conceived along the same thematic and format execution lines as

10998-508: The vast majority of published book series were conceived, initiated and produced by Time Life itself, which included the Australian branch initiated Australian at War series, the company also (re)issued on occasion series in similar vein they were either especially commissioned for by outside parties, or as licensee of series that were originally conceived, produced and/or released by third-party publishers elsewhere, typically for release on

11115-449: Was Luce, who had long opposed FDR. Historian Alan Brinkley argues the move was "badly mistaken", for had Luce been allowed to travel, he would have been an enthusiastic cheerleader for American forces around the globe. But stranded in New York City, Luce's frustration and anger expressed itself in hard-edged partisanship. Luce, supported by Editor T. S. Matthews , appointed Whittaker Chambers as acting Foreign News editor in 1944, despite

11232-487: Was a difference though; did Time Life Books contend itself with the standard one-to-two minute long commercials, Time Life Music also made much more use of half hour commercials, which they poured in the guise of documentaries, the so-called " infomercials ", and not rarely presented by artists whose music was presented on the underlying release. The television advertisements used slogans (e.g., "Relive your high school days ..."), clips of songs included in each volume (along with

11349-542: Was acquired by IAC's Dotdash and became Dotdash Meredith ; Barry Diller , the head of IAC, had previous relations with Time Inc. in the early 1980s when he was head of Paramount and helped make Time Inc. at one point a co-owner of the USA Network . Time' s offices were originally in the Chrysler Building . In 1938, they moved to the seven upper floors of the newly built 1 Rockefeller Plaza in Rockefeller Center . In 1960, they moved to fifteen floors of

11466-556: Was an American worldwide mass media corporation founded on November 28, 1922, by Henry Luce and Briton Hadden and based in New York City . It owned and published over 100 magazine brands, including its namesake Time , Sports Illustrated , Travel + Leisure , Food & Wine , Fortune , People , InStyle , Life , Golf Magazine , Southern Living , Essence , Real Simple , and Entertainment Weekly . It also had subsidiaries which it co-operated with

11583-573: Was announced that Meredith Corporation would acquire Time Inc. in a $ 2.8 billion deal. $ 640 million in backing will be provided by Koch Equity Development , but the Koch family will not have a board seat or otherwise influence the company's operations. Prior to the sale closing in January 2018, Time Inc. sold Essence Communications to Richelieu Dennis, the founder of hair- and skin-care products maker Sundial Brands. In January 2018, Meredith removed signage and references to Time, Inc., and Time, Inc. website

11700-434: Was baptized "Time & Life Building" when it was built in 1951-53 as the then-European headquarters of "Time & Life International, Ltd.", but contrary to its New York City counterparts, it kept the name after the company had vacated the premises in late-August 2009. In the early years, when the company was just Time magazine, Luce served as business manager while Hadden was editor-in-chief, and they annually alternated

11817-613: Was called " Il Duce ".) Once ambitious to become Secretary of State in a Republican administration, Luce wrote a famous article in Life magazine in 1941, called " The American Century ", which defined the role of American foreign policy for the remainder of the 20th century, and perhaps beyond. President Franklin D. Roosevelt , aware that most publishers were opposed to him, issued a decree in 1943 that blocked all publishers and media executives from visits to combat areas; he put General George Marshall in charge of enforcement. The main target

11934-552: Was critically acclaimed by the Los Angeles Times where it was stated in a 1966 editorial that the series "(…)demonstrates the imposing possibilities of pictorial history… This, of course, is to be expected from the TIME-LIFE specialists. What is even more important is the selection of scholars of the reputation of Bowra and Hadas for texts. Research is meticulous and relevant. This is history written with respect for

12051-553: Was featured in Time Life's early Great Ages of Man and The Emergence of Man series. However, historians were forced to largely rewrite Mayan history after their script had been fully unlocked and modern technology had revolutionized Maya archeology in the 21st century, making the Time Life book entries on the subject obsolete and outdated. This even held true for their 1993 "The Magnificent Maya" outing ( ISBN   0809498790 ) in their more recent Lost Civilizations series. Some other series were less highly regarded, especially

12168-563: Was issued in the early 1990s, more than 50 different volumes (including two Christmas albums) had been released. This paved the way for more country and pop music-intensive series, including " Country USA ," " Classic Rock ," " Sounds of the Seventies ," "Sounds of the Eighties," "Your Hit Parade" (a series featuring popular music of the 1940s through early 1960s) and " Super Hits ." Like the earlier series, each volume issued had its own paperback booklet containing liner notes and information about

12285-410: Was kept as a brand name however, though the copyright disclaimer had it emphatically stated that it is "not affiliated with Time Warner Inc. or Time [& Life], Inc.," the former owners of the Time and Life magazines, and from which the company name originated from in the first place. At the time of the takeover, it was reported the Time-Life, Inc.'s turnover had contracted to US$ 350 million, turning

12402-443: Was known as the direct-to-consumer (DTC) business model. From its very launch in 1961 it was a runaway success with sales already expected to reach US$ 100 million one year into its existence. Prior to the division's establishment, Time, Inc. had already dabbled with single-title book publications on an occasional, ad-hoc basis such as the 1957 "Three Hundred Years of American Painting" ( OCLC   339210 ) or 1961 "Great Battles of

12519-413: Was known that a particular series title enjoyed a much smaller print run than the other volumes in the series, resulting in the after-market value of that particular volume and/or the set as a whole increasing initially – though the general trend of waning interest in physical books, those of Time-Life included, has caused these prices to decrease again after the turn of the millennium. Examples include

12636-464: Was launched in 1994, with content from the Time, People and Fortune magazines. It was shut down in 1999. On October 20, 2000, Time Inc. announced that it would acquire the magazine division of Times Mirror Company that includes Field & Stream , Golf Magazine , Outdoor Life , Popular Science , Skiing and Yachting from the Tribune Company for $ 475 million, the merger

12753-562: Was let go May 19, 2016 On February 5, 2014, Time Inc. announced that it was cutting 500 jobs with most of the layoffs at American Express Publishing. From April 2014 to mid-2017, the Chairman of Time Inc. was Joseph A. Ripp, who had been Chief Executive since September 2013 and continued as Executive Chairman when replaced as CEO by Battista. Though Ripp had intended to remain Executive Chairman until 2018, he wound up leaving

12870-507: Was promoted to president and CEO, replacing Joseph A. Ripp. Time Inc. purchased American Express Publishing Corporation 's suite of titles, including Travel + Leisure , Food & Wine , Departures , Black Ink and Executive Travel on October 1, 2013. On January 14, 2014, Time Inc. announced that Colin Bodell was joining the company in the newly created position of executive vice president and chief technology officer. However, he

12987-521: Was redirected to the Meredith's website. In March 2018, only six weeks after the closure of the deal, Meredith announced that it would lay off 1,200 employees, and explore the sale of Time , Fortune , Money , and Sports Illustrated . The company felt that these brands did not align with its core, lifestyle-oriented properties. Howard Milstein had announced on February 7, 2018, that he would acquire Golf Magazine from Meredith, and Time Inc. UK

13104-484: Was signed for several Spanish-language series editions in Europe – for Latin America Time-Life Books resorted to (smaller) local publishers on an ad-hoc basis. The British, French, German and Dutch European edition releases though, were handled by Time-Life themselves through their in 1976 established subsidiary branch "Time-Life International (Nederland) B.V." (renamed to "Time-Life Books B.V." in

13221-538: Was sold to the British private equity group Epiris (later rebranded to TI Media ) in late February. In September 2018, Meredith announced that it would re-sell Time to Marc Benioff and his wife Lynne for $ 190 million. Although Benioff is the chairman and co-CEO of Salesforce.com , Time will remain separate from the company, and Benioff will not be involved in its daily operations. In November 2018, Meredith announced to sell Fortune to Thai businessman Chatchaval Jiaravanon for $ 150 million. In December 2021, Meredith

13338-709: Was subsequently completed in November of that year, forming Time4Media (the magazines in the division, with the exception of Golf Magazine and the Parenting Group were sold to Bonnier Group in 2007) In January 2005, Time Inc. announced that it would purchase a remaining stake in New York City-based Essence Communications, publishers of the Essence magazine that it not already own. (Time already purchased 49% stake in

13455-452: Was succeeded by Richard Parsons who had never been connected to legacy Time Inc. (his successor Jeff Bewkes , leader of the parent when Time Inc. was spun off, had like Levin come from the non-publishing operations). The Time, Inc. (the comma remained part of the formal title until the Warner merger but the company ceased to use it in 1933) corporate entity diversified out of publishing in

13572-577: Was succeeded by Shepley, who retained that position for a time after he, in turn, stepped down as president. Davidson also served as chairman of the executive committee after stepping down as chairman of the board. Munro was chairman of the executive committee of Time Warner from 1990 to 1996. On the merger with Warner Communications Munro and then Nicholas were co-CEOs of Time Warner with Steve Ross until 1992 when Ross squeezed Nicholas out. Gerald M. Levin , who had come up through Time's non-publishing operations, succeeded Ross later that year and in 2002

13689-527: Was the highly exclusive Roxburghe Club , founded in London in 1812. Although many of the 19th-century societies have ceased to exist, others (including the Roxburghe Club) continue to operate, and new societies continue to be founded. The modern societies mostly focus on publishing editions of archival records, and are now more usually known as record or records societies . 20th century book clubs in

#28971