Author name: editor

Gone with Wind Begins Shooting (Photoplay Magazine, 1939)
1939, Gone with the Wind Articles, Photoplay Magazine

Gone with Wind Begins Shooting
(Photoplay Magazine, 1939)

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Jack Wade, one of the many Hollywood reporters for Photoplay, must have let loose a big girlish squeal when he got word from the Selznick-International man that he would not get bounced off the set of Gone with the Wind
if he were to swing by to take a look.

First of all, a report on Vivien Leigh…Hollywood already agreed that she’s the happiest choice any one could have made. Even swamp angels from deepest Dixie put their okay on her accent…Clark Gable looks like the real Big-Man-From-the-South. In a black frock coat, starched bosom and ruffles, he makes a menacing, impressive Rhett, and he’s a little pleased about it, too.

The Visual Accuracy of the 'Gone with the Wind' (Click Magazine, 1939)
1939, Click Magazine, Gone with the Wind Articles

The Visual Accuracy of the ‘Gone with the Wind’
(Click Magazine, 1939)

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This page from Click Magazine contrasts three Civil War photographs by Matthew Brady (1822 – 1896) with three production stills snapped on the sets of Gone with the Wind. The editors refused to weigh-in on the slowly building case regarding Hollywood’s questionable abilities to portray historic events with any degree of accuracy, preferring instead to praise the filmmakers as to how carefully they checked details.


The Matthew Brady images provided on the attached page only serves to condemn the otherwise flawless work of Gone with the Wind costume designer Walter Plunkett (1902 – 1982) who historians and reënactors have slandered through the years for failing to fully grasp the look of the era.

The Producer: David O. Selznick (Film Daily, 1939)
1939, Film Daily Magazine, Gone with the Wind Articles

The Producer: David O. Selznick
(Film Daily, 1939)

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Observers of the career of David O. Selznick see his enterprises this year the culmination of a dream….The most lavish motion picture project ever conceived, Gone With the Wind, is already acknowledged as Selznick’s chef d’oeuvre and the picture destined to mark the peak of cinema progress during the past 50 years. Executives of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, which company released the picture, as well as those of Selznick International who have seen it, are unanimous in declaring it the greatest picture ever made, and the most frequent comment heard today from those who have observed it in production is ‘No one could have made it but Selznick.’


Selznick produced blockbuster after blockbuster. He was awarded two Academy Awards during his Hollywood reign for ‘Outstanding Production’: one for Gone With the Wind in 1939 and another one year later for Rebecca.

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An Interview with the Author (Yank Magazine, 1945)
1945, Gone with the Wind Articles, Yank Magazine

An Interview with the Author
(Yank Magazine, 1945)

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A Yank Magazine interview with the author of Gone with the Wind (1936).

At the time this article was printed, Margaret Mitchell (1900-1949; Pulitzer Prize 1937) was an American publishing phenomenon; Gone with the Wind (or GWTW, to those in the know) was said to be the fastest selling novel in the history of American publishing. Her one book had a sales record of 50,000 copies in one day and approximately 1,500,000 during it’s first year. By May of 1941 the sales reached 3,368,000 in the English language alone (there were 18 translations made in all; the novel was a blockbuster in Germany, where 5000,000 editions were swiftly sold).


Available from Amazon: Gone with the Windstyle=border:none

Duke of Windsor vs Geoffrey Dennis 1937 | Duke of Windsor Libeled by Author Geoffrey Dennis 1937 | Coronation Commentary 1937 Despised by Duke of Windsor
1937, Duke of Windsor, Pathfinder Magazine

The Duke Went After An Author
(Pathfinder Magazine, 1937)

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Perhaps one of the unmentioned reasons for America’s revolt against the crown in 1776 was our revulsion of their power to cancel publication of any book of their choosing (there have been exceptions) – primarily books they deem slanderous of The Firm. This certainly was the case in 1937 when the newly minted Duke of Windsor (previously Edward VIII) sought to block all further publication of Coronation Commentary (1937) by Geoffrey Dennis. He succeeded in doing so on grounds of libel – but not before hundreds of copies could be published.

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Her Divorces (Literary Digest, 1936)
1936, Duke of Windsor, The Literary Digest

Her Divorces
(Literary Digest, 1936)

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An interesting article that reported on the the successful filing of Mrs. Simpson’s second divorce (a photo of the document is attached) with a few words mentioned regarding the stigma of divorce within court circles and how ruthlessly she was treated by the American press corps:

Nobody mentioned the King. For that matter, no British newspaper mentioned that Mrs. Simpson was his friend.
But minutes before the Baltimore belle slipped out of Ipswich Assizes with her second divorce in her pocket, a million conversations were being launched around the world with the phrase:

‘Now that she’s free-‘

Stuck in Nassau (Click Magazine, 1941)
1941, Click Magazine, Duke of Windsor

Stuck in Nassau
(Click Magazine, 1941)

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This Click Magazine article concerns the diplomatic posting to Nassau, Bahamas that was the lot of the Duke of Windsor shortly after the outbreak of World War Two. The Duke and Duchess had gleefully met Adolf Hitler some two years earlier and, following that error, were overheard on a few occasions making defeatist statements concerning the British war effort. Wishing to keep him in a spot where he could do no damage yet still be monitored, the British Foreign Office granted him the title of Royal Governor and posted him to Nassau.
Illustrated by four seldom-seen color photographs that, no doubt, the two were simply delighted to pose for, the interview makes clear just how bored the Windsors were on that hot, sticky island paradise, where they remained until 1945.

Can Mrs. Simpson Marry the King? (Literary Digest, 1936)
1936, Duke of Windsor, The Literary Digest

Can Mrs. Simpson Marry the King?
(Literary Digest, 1936)

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Once the cat was out of the bag and the whole world had learned of the whirlwind romance between the King of England and the twice-divorced American social-climber Wallis Simpson (1896 – 1986), one of the favorite social pastimes soon involved musing aloud as to whether British laws would permit him to marry such a woman. Constitutionally, the King cannot marry a Roman Catholic, which she was (although this journalist erroneously stated that she wasn’t); recognizing he couldn’t get around this law, he abdicated.

This article can be printed.

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Henpecked (Coronet Magazine, 1953)
1953, Coronet Magazine, Duke of Windsor

Henpecked
(Coronet Magazine, 1953)

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Assorted snide stories concerning the Duke of Windsor – the world he made and the man he became:

It is both sad and amusing to see a former King of England reduced by the woman he loves to a ‘Little Man’, to the rank of a meek husband. What should one do, laugh or cry, when one looks at the ex-Caesar in the role of handbag-carrier, a sort of walking ornament…

The World He Made for Himself (Coronet Magazine, 1953)
1953, Coronet Magazine, Duke of Windsor

The World He Made for Himself
(Coronet Magazine, 1953)

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The ‘real’ world into which the Duke has entered by his ‘own’ free will is international café society, that glittering, gilded bubble floating above the stormy seas of history…The Duke lives a rather different life. An hour or so with one of those American businessmen he admires, following tips on the market, looking over the quotations in stocks and bonds, and he has nothing to trouble about for the day, or the next month or so, until another empty hour obtrudes itself in the almost ceaseless round of pleasure like a hole in time waiting to be plugged by something, anything.


Available at Amazon: Gone with the Windsorsstyle=border:none

The Duchess (Coronet Magazine, 1953)
1953, Coronet Magazine, Duke of Windsor

The Duchess
(Coronet Magazine, 1953)

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Attached is an unflattering essay by biographer Iles Brody, who beautifully captured the Duchess of Windsor and her unending pursuit of the chic. Obsessed with self-image, this column lists the fashion houses and boutiques that were most favored by Wallis Simpson.


Despite her wealth, the Duchess loved a good bargain.

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His Fashion Influence (Men's Wear, 1950)
1950, Duke of Windsor, Men's Wear Magazine

His Fashion Influence
(Men’s Wear, 1950)

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The Duke’s influence on men’s fashion throughout the Western hemisphere is undeniable and it is highly likely that there are a number of bucks in your life who loaf about town entirely ignorant that they are wearing the togs that he first introduced.
The attached is a 1950 article from an American fashion trade magazine that lists a number of fashion innovations first sported by the Duke of Windsor, illustrated by seven photos.

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1936, Duke of Windsor, The Literary Digest

What was Known About Her
(Literary Digest, 1936)

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This article can be divided into two parts: the first half addresses King Edward VIII and his concern for the impoverished souls of his realm who languished daily in squalor, while the second half was devoted to gossip and innuendo as to who Wallis Simpson was, what was her Baltimore life like and when did she first see the king.

(She first saw him in 1920).

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