Helping us pick the Man of the Year for our first January cover has become quite a tradition with subscribers--so you might be interested to learn that the whole thing began because the first week of 1928 was so dull.

No one had done anything newsworthy enough to put his picture on TIME's cover, so somebody suggested we stop looking for a Man of the Week and pick a Man of the Year. This was an easy choice: Charles Augustus Lindbergh, who had soloed the Atlantic in only 33 hours and 39 minutes, was the hero of 1927.

The Man of the Year idea caught on with a bang and, somewhat surprised, we decided to make it an annual event. The choice is in no way an accolade, nor a Nobel Prize for doing good. Nor is it a moral judgment. (Al Capone was runner-up in riotous, bootleg 1928.) The two criteria are always these: who had the biggest rise in fame; and who did the most to change the news for better (like Stalin in 1942) or for worse (like Stalin in 1939, when his flop to Hitler's side unleashed this worldwide war).

Fifteen different men have been chosen in 18 years--with one man picked three times and one man twice.

For 1928 we passed up Herbert Hoover, just elected President, because that year was the businessman's year and Walter P. Chrysler was his symbol. When Business crashed in 1929 we passed by Hoover again, skipped over Explorer Byrd and Peace-Pacter Kellogg in favor of Owen D. Young, back from Paris with his plan for settling Europe's troubles under his arm.

We turned down Bobby Jones, Joseph Stalin and Adolf Hitler (who had just mobilized an unexpected 6,401,210 Nazi votes in Germany) to make Mohandas K. Gandhi Man of 1930. He was in jail when his selection was announced in TIME--for launching civil disobedience to get the British out of India. Next year was "a lean year for everybody," as old Ramsay MacDonald put it: Man of 1931 was Pierre Laval, picked for having steered France prosperously through 12 months which had meant breadlines in almost every other land (Laval hasn't had a good year since).

Franklin Roosevelt was picked in 1932--for winning a landslide election on a program of government economy. He was Man of the Year again in 1934, but not for economy. (That year Mussolini, Harry Hopkins and Huey Long also rated high in reader nominations.) In 1933 came NRAdministrator Hugh Johnson--then flying high with the Blue Eagle.

Man of 1935 surprised some. We picked him because that year he had "carried his country into brilliant focus before a pop-eyed world." He was Haile Selassie, Emperor of Ethiopia, Power of Trinity I, King of Kings, Elect of God, Light of the World, Conquering Lion of Judah. Man of 1936 was a woman--Wallis Warfield Simpson--and 1937's choice was a couple: Generalissimo and Mme. Chiang Kaishek.

No one but Hitler could be Man of 1938, but despite Hitler's victories Winston Churchill proved himself Man of 1940. Franklin Roosevelt was chosen for the third time in 1941, after Pearl Harbor made him America's sixth wartime president. And maybe you'll remember that General George C. Marshall held the place last year, as the man who, more than anyone else, could be said to have "armed the Republic."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.