Ken's End

In March 1938 Esquire's smart Publisher David Smart and Editor Arnold Gingrich began to publish the magazine Ken. It was a political chip off Esquire's editorial block. Its editorial program was to tell the "inside story of world events," the inside usually being more dirt on the dictatorships. But it did not go really leftish and its original leftish editorial connections--Jay Cooke Allen (Chicago Tribune'?, foreign correspondent), George Seldes (You Can't Print That!), Ernest Hemingway-- gradually drifted away. Editor Gingrich went on publishing sensational "inside" stories, not consistently taking any political side, while Ken drifted also as a business venture.

Nevertheless Ken, appearing biweekly, maintained a nine-month circulation average of some 250,000, but failed to attract any substantial amount of advertising. Then subscriptions began to fall off. Last March, hoping to meet its total monthly circulation guarantees to advertisers, it began to publish four issues a month instead of two. In June Ken tried again to bolster circulation by cutting its price from 25-c- to 10-c- a copy. Last week Messrs. Smart and Gingrich announced Ken's end with the issue of August 3. Editor Gingrich wrote to subscribers: "Rather than to employ inflationary methods, the publishers preferred to admit that 'they backed the wrong horse.' "

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