present biographies of every president, organized by the ranking. visit our website, c-span.org/thepresidents and order your copy today, wherever books are sold. >> next, historian susan ronald recounts the life of publishing magnate condé nast whose magazine if i included vote and "vanity fair." >> a very warm welcome to the first lecture of the general society, , labor, literature and landmark lecture series. i am karin taylor, program director of the general society. the labor, literature and landmark lectures are supported in part i public funds from the new york city department of cultural affairs in partnership with the cityfa council.

for those of you who may be less familiar with the general society, and if you don't mind i will ask, how many of you here this evening with this be your first visit? well, a warm welcome, and also of course a welcome back to previous attendees. the general society was founded in 1785 by 22 artisans. today, our 234 year old organization continues to serve the people of the city of new york. we do this through our cultural and educational programs. they include our lecture series, of which of course denies lecture is a part of. our general society library which will be celebrating 200 years next year. our tuition free mechanics' institute, and that john loughlin locked collection which

you are welcomeec to visit after our talk this evening, and that is upstairs. you will find more information on the blue and white cards on your suit. now, we have such a wonderful start to this year's lecture season and with the pleasure of welcoming critically acclaimed susan ronald who tonight will discuss her biography of condé nast, the publishing legend of vote and "vanity fair" and other illustrious publications. i also want to mention if you've not already done so, you have an opportunity to purchase this wonderful book, with its stunning cover later this evening so please be aware you had this opportunity and i'm sure susan would be happy to find the book for you. i also want to mention that c-span is also filming this talk tonight, so this program will also be rebroadcast on booktv.

and when we do get to the q&a portion, i want to remind you that anyone was asking a question, that you also have the opportunity to be featured on booktv. born and raised inn the united states, ms. ronald has lived in england for more than 25 years and has come over especially this week to talk about her book. she is the author of a dangerous woman, hitler's art thief, hieratic queen, the pirate queen, and shakespeare's daughter. it is myofof considerable please to introduce to you susan ronald. [applause] >> thank you, everybody. i just hope our technical programs are at an end. so you may see this musical dots

on the bottom. write about condé nast really because i tend to write about power and greed. all of the people i've written about before, there's another book which isn't andra, have been very powerful people, some of them have been greedy, almost all of them have at had some st of a brush with the law. but after dangerous woman, about florence gould was back to the youngest son of jacob gould,, many of you will certainly know of,ge i decided that having written about someone who was incredibly powerful, incredibly devious and also the banker to hermann goring by the end of the war, and never ever was tried for dastardly deeds, i need to cleanse myself. i wantnt to write about a really good person. so i told this to my agent and my publisher, and they just

looked blankly at me said you're right about power and greed. how could you write about a nice person? it was my agent who suggested i have a look at the publishing there anynd aye are good guys and publishing? sure enough he was right. i decided i'm going to write, but i was write a book about one of the most powerful people at the turn of the century, and then going into world war ii, condé nast. of course a lot of you know all of the various magazines but they were not all there at the beginning. i would like to taket you throh what made condé nast conde nast. fortuitous circumstances, but mostly, i apologize for the quality of some of these i photographs. there was his mother who is pictured on the right. unfortunately i don't have her as a young woman. this is the only picture that the family still has in their possession. she was quite a lady in her own

right. her father wasdy a guy called louis and he settled in st. louis in this lovely home here. he was married three times and had 15 children. he was extremely wealthy. he was a banker. apparently a good guy. and it does exactly go with the term banker but go with me on this, okay? he left several million dollars to his children when he died. condé as a child remembers playing in his grandfathers, his paternal grandfathers bedroom. it is currently still a historic house on the outskirts of st. louis mostly as a wedding venue today. but, of course,we esther, his mother, only inherited 300,000 by the time the money came down to her. now, on his fathers side his grandfather was born in germany and immigrated to the united states as a teacher.

but was always a depressive chap, very serious. he became, he converted to methodism and he became known as the father of german methodism in north america. his eldest son william was a man who wanted to be born with a silver spoon in his mouth, but the family didn't have any. so he decided he was going to go off to germany as the american consul to germany and by himself in uniform so he could hobnob with all of the royals. his father was beside himself, naturally will gymnast had felt on very, very hard he also stole money from american citizens while he was there. he left germany very quickly under a cloud and took a number of odd jobs and somehow met up with esther in new york city.

condé was the eldest son. he had another brother louis who was a great pianist, but condé grew up essentially without a father. at the age of three william decided his going back to europe to make his fortune. actually it was more like hard work onlyy for suckers. condé was the man of the family. he had two younger sisters as well who were what they called new women. new women were women who made their own rules, who didn't hang around with chaperones before the turn of the 20th century, who actually were extremely independent. and so was his mother. she had to be to keep the family together. but, of course, as the years went on his father stayed away until condé was 17. things get pretty tough in the end. the only member of the family that stayed close to them was his ex ante -- family pictures

quite a gal herself. she married into money. she loved fine things. she was very stylish in her own ways and considering this picture was taken in the 1880s, you can see that she did like to look nice. what is amazing is that she married into the campbell family of procter & gamble fame. so she decided she is going to help outs poor esther to get hr sons to an american college that would set them on their way. the only problem is when she went to visit louis, apparently was very untidy. he reminded her a great deal of her brother who of course abandoned the family and, therefore, she decided she would only send condé to georgetown university. louis never spoke to his brother again. so here is condé as he graduated.

he was a very handsome young man. his best friend at college was bob colyer, and bob collier was of course the air to the colyer library. he went a year or two to europe, to england, oxford, came back and his father said i'm going to give you colliers weekly because it's failing. they'll have something like $1000 with of advertising at the time that he gave the weekly over to bob. bob did a lot of work with condi at georgetown and he went down to st. louis and talked condé into accepting the job with them, which he did. considering he was the man of the film, fortunately "condé's father died and so is no longer a drain on the family and the two of them worked very free happily indeed for about 15 years. bob colyer pictured left here

was an innovator, and he thought about making collier's less of a generalized magazine but with condi pushing them and say look, we can really sell advertising, it we decide we're going to create specialal issues. so you saw before the other picture i just showed you was really the issue for rim attends art, this was the issue that started the gibson girls going ingo terms of collier's magazin. .. at ladies home journal so he could have him exclusively for a period of 2 years and that was something conde learned about as well area and collier was also very into navigation. his great friend was orville >> and with conde. they set up the first

national-- not national, magazine company that had its own sales network in every major city across america. conde understood to sell magazines you understand to that the customers wanted to read the advertising. that the customers wasn't wasting money on advertising and ethical in what you sold. this was the era of quack medicines. almost every newspaper promised to give you something special to cure-- i don't think i would want any swamp root, i don't know about you, but i think that that's pretty bad thank you this product claimed peru nut claimed it could cure almost anything. so colliers joined, with believe it or not, ladies home journal to stop quack medicine advertising. they believed it was killing americans. this is just a few other of the

ads at the time. you can have your diabetes r readily cured. the then urbanepesqui, cure us thirst and we don't go into dr. bandit's products. and cw post who founded post cereal was one who was selling cereals as a medicine. there's no -- here is to another year and years and years of steady nerves, clear brains and vigorous health. well, collier spurred on by conde decided he was going to sue old cw and he did and he won. he learned a great deal with nis relationship with bob. not only that, but bob introduced him to his first

wife clarisse. i don't know if any of you rer the legal firm. cudair brothers. they came across to america on behalf of la lafayette, george washington's friends and they established themselves and clarisse was part of new york's 400. conde was by now a wealthy man in 1902, when he married her, earning about $40,000 a year, the only person in america earning more at the time was theodore roosevelt as president, he earned $50,000. so she decided that she loved bob collier, but bob collier didn't love her. so conde was a good second from her point of view. he wasn't after her money. he understood that she held the whip hand as far as society was

concerned. the only problem is conde understood that society was changing and women were changing and their role was changing, they wanted to become independent, they wanted the vote, they wanted their thoughts to be recognized and while certainly clarisse felt that was for her, too, she didn't really like the idea of working for a living because that was beneath a member of the 400 on the social register. instead, after two years of marriage where she had two children, cudair the son first and then natika, the daughter, she decided she was going to go off to paris and about many a sporano in the singers in paris. of course, she would because her three sisters would as well. one of them had been supporting the artist rodin as his moneymaker for the previous 20 years. now, that isn't very good for a

marriage, obviously. conde decided in 1904 that he was going to set up on his own. yes, bob collier was paying him more money than he was worth, there was no doubt about it, $40,000 a year in those days was close on a million dollars. but essentially he decided he was going to take a plunge into women's fashion and say, why women's fashion? here he is at a national magazine, they're starting to go into the niche markets. conde decided that women's fashion was going to be key to the changing role of women. up until now, women's fashion in terms of the clothing that would be put into patterns had two distinct shortcomings. the first, of course, all patterns were giveaways alongside fabrics. the second which was even more incredible was the fact that there was only one size and

conde decided the new woman has many sizes. i'm going to empower her. i'm going to empower women without money to make their own clothing in all the sizes that they come in and that they should just discard their corsets, enjoy life and be women. of course, he was right. and he ended up allowing ladies home journal to own label his home patterns. so home pattern company was his first company. he's still working for bob collier, due to circumstances he ended up leaving in 1906. 1907, the first time he tried to buy vogue, but he failed. he went across to europe at that point to rescue his two children from paris and his wife, she decided that she wanted to stay on and so they went across and picked up the children and the nurse maid. clarisse decided she would come home, too. but then in 1909 he bought

vogue and clarisse disappeared again for six months. nobody in the family knows why, but she did. he bought-- lucky enough to buy vogue. sadly, because its owner at that time, a guy called arthur turner, who was port of gro grollo grollors, a big club at the time, he had set it up early in 1895 and he'd hired on a lady at that point as a mail clerk on the left, her name is edna chase. by the time you see her on the right, she had been the editor of vogue or the editor in chief in vogue for over 50 years. conde kept her on, obviously. it was turner's sister who had been the actual editor at the time that he bought it and she basically left due to a disagreement over some money. 1912, he decided buying two

more magazines and puts them into one, something called house and garden. i think a few of you have heard of that one, too. so now he has home pattern, vogue, house and garden, we're only 1912. by 1914, he decides he'd really like to set up an international magazine empire dedicated to women and women's fashion. unfortunately there's something called world war i which began in europe in 1914, for america it began in 1917. edna chase comes up to conde, i've got a wonderful idea, i know we're cut off from french fashion and cut off from the british men's fashion because of the war, but why don't we have something called a charity fashion show and it will get the new york 400 involved and conde was skeptical. clarisse doesn't like working. can you imagine these women working on a charity fashion

show? of course she made it a success. she went to mrs. fish, whose name was mamie and was able to talk her into creating this fashion show. and mamie teleed mrs. aster. it was a done deal. the only problem, it was arranged to be the at ritz carlton in new york, the problem with the models for all of the fashions previously were tied to varied fashion house ins europe, not in america, but mrs. aster and mrs. fish were able to cobble together a very interesting show of new york fashion. don't laugh. here it is. >> the new york library found some stills of the fashion. and the models were tied to other places and fortunately conde was making clothes in different sizes because not all of them were models, were they?

so there's more of these apparently at the new york city public library and i thought it would be really interesting to see. anyway, this upset another gentleman called william randolph hearst who just bought harper's bazaar and he sent his people out to bad-mouth vogue and conde nast as people who wanted to get rid of european fashion and not to import anymore and only out to support new york clothing designers, et cetera, et cetera. what happened conde's representative arrive in paris during the war with a big fat check for the seamstresses who had been put out of work. hearst lost the first round, but he never did give up. we all know that. come 1915, two things happened, the most important one was a lunch with a gentleman who founded the coffee house in this building, frank ronan

shield. frank was a great afficianado of modern art. he was everybody's favorite, and had miles and acres of friends throughout new york city and conde had lunch with him probably at the coffee house actually, i don't know where exactly, and he said, i've got a problem. i've bought two magazines called "dress" and ""vanity fair"", i've tried to he had debt him myself. i'm a publisher not an editor. what do you think i'm getting wrong? frank said, it's simple, you have to make a sizzle. you have to make it a cocktail party every time somebody turns the page, they're actually joining you in a conversation. they're actually understanding what it is that everybody in society or everybody who we read about is thinking about. and so conde decided to hire frank on as the editor for

"vanity fair" on a handshake. he did his best deals on a handshake. they had one competitor at the time, mankin was the editor and it was the smart set where they said, one civilized reader is worth a thousand boneheads. [laughter] >> well, smart set especial especially-- eventually went out of business and they had a friendly rivalry between them. and george mason who worked at smartset ended up working at "vanity fair" after it closed. conde believed in hiring the best people no matter what. it didn't matter whether they were gay, lesbian, jewish, catholic, whatever, black, it didn't matter. what mattered was talent. it didn't matter if they were known. so he hired a girl called dorothy rothchild to write captions for vogue.

the one that caught frank's high is brevity is the soul of lingerie. she kept dropping poems on frank's test to transfer from little old vogue into "vanity fair." finally he agreed to take her on. he then also wanted to take on somebody to make the "vanity fair" articles more substantial, so he brought on the chap in the middle, a guy called robert benchley he was actually one of the funniest people i've read about and i've read his own biography and it's absolutely hysterical, but he was a harvard graduate, he had been the editor of the harvard lampoon and he got the job because he was going to get all very serious. i opened the book with one of the incidents that happened while they were working there. benchley went on to win an oscar for a short that was produced by mgm called "how to

sleep." and it is hysterically funny if you can ever get a hold of it. dorothy, of course, would eventually go on to other things, but the third person in the picture is a gentleman called robert sherwood who is about 6 foot 8. fresh out of the army in 1919 and came to work. he said he was a very good writer. frank wanted to believe him. he had been very wounded during the war, he had been gassed, he had been shot in the legs. as dorothy said, how did they miss his heart? this guy was enormous. sherwood would go on actually to win four pulitzer prizes and become the speech writer for fdr. so, these were all unknowns, but they all misbehaved tremendously and of course, ended up getting fired. yeah, well, it was all -- it

was all basically because dorothy decided, as theater critic by the now, that she was going to go after broadway producers and she ended up libelling them and he had no choice and conde really didn't want to fire him and knew she had to go and it was poor frank who had to do it. so during the war he sets up british vogue because he can't export paper from america, believe it or not, during world war i and decides at the end of the war in 1919 that he's going to go across to europe and set up a french vogue. so he's now become the first international magazine publisher in the world. now, we talked about a few of the staff writersen just going to show you a few pictures because of course, that's what magazines are all about, right? his number one photographer was a

awe-- demeyer, and hearst decided to poach demeyer. it was-- george henigan hune, replaced him and it was george who took the first pictures of movement. he was followed by edward stieken and of course, cecil beaten later on. and then there was the discover of the model turned photographer, lee miller. now, lee miller actually was vogue's war photographer during the second world war. we'll come back onto her pictures in a minute. so, this is an example of the type of picture that adolf demeyer took. it's actually mary pickford's

wedding dress to douglas fairbanks, sr. and its conde's daughter who was modeling it, it was apparently so small nobody, but a child could fit into it. this is a lady called grace moore who was the met's soprano and became conde mistress in 1919 when his marriage to clarisse finally broke up. the picture is one of hune's pictures and shows that now they're starting to play with shadows and light in a way that's more akin to what we're used to today. but stieken is the one who created the celebrity photograph. here we have gloria swanson and charlie chaplain, adele and fred he fred astaire. and then greta garbo and this

is cecil's specialty, he used to make people of a certain weight thin. and here is how he managed to change helena rubenstein from a rather portly lady into somebody who was quite beautiful, but then again, cecil was friendly with the british aristocracy and when it came time for the abdication of edward viii to marry wallace simpson, was beaten who took the pictures of the true tr trou troud troudsseau. >> and the only pictures lee miller, what happened when she walked into one of the huts at

dachau. i mentioned that he hired lots of writers and lots of everything. people as diverse as f. scott fitzgerald. and believe it or not jack dempsey. all of these people wrote for him. what mattered was the diversity, the fact that people had something special to give to the reader. the artists were incredible. this is benito, eduardo benito, one of his famous covers. here we have carl ericsson with one of his more beautiful, just very light touches for one of his-- for one of the models that he drew. now, i'm going to say miguel-- i always get his name wrong, but you know who i mean. he did some of the more fanciful vogue covers. now, the other thing that happened with the photography and vogue in particular, was that you never doubted what any picture was trying to sell you.

so, here we have sandals, hats, we also have marlana dietrich who is modeling a hat, more hats. if you want to buy cosmetics you have to have the gold compact and the jewelry to go with it, don't you? and the covers, it was not unusual to see black people on the covers of vogue in the 1930's. you always knew what every issue was going to sell you. and then there came a fresh face to vogue, caramel white as she was at the time. caramel snow as she became when she married palin snow one of the 400. she arrived and she was a complete breath of fresh air. completely untrained just like edna had been in the beginning.

her only claim to fame was that her brother worked for william randolph hearst. little did conde know that that would actually mean something in several years tense, but carmel's husband was very much into sport and she was very much into the idea that women could do anything and go anywhere and be anything, and so, the covers became more exotic. you had women who were actually doing sport, who were riding camels, who were shooting, who were going skiing, boating, doing all kinds of activities, but he never forgot his core business which was selling clothing and fashion to women. so you could look at the cover and you know, they're trying to sell me jewelry. here we have the beginning of the paris season, the beginning of the new york season. everything was done with a purpose so that the customer and the reader always knew what

they were getting. the advertiser always knew that they were advertising in an issue that meant something to the people. and meanwhile, conde's friendship with frank blossomed. they were really like brothers. there were a lot of rumors that they were gay. i don't know about frank one way or the other. i know edmund wilson one of the editors at "vanity fair" for a very brief period of time believed that he was a u eunuch and conde was always was seen with a woman on his arm after he and clarisse split up. it took many years for her to agree to a divorce, but that's something in the future. >> in the meantime, clarisse moved to 1000 park avenue and their daughter natika became

the hostess of many of conde's famous parties and he moved to park, and lc dewolf decorated the apartment. that's where the most cafe society parties took place. i'd like to think of mrs. aster dancing with groucho marx. i can't imagine him dancing, but anyone who was a trend setter was at the party. invited to the party. frequently had he didn't know conde to begin with. that was the case with charles lindbergh, as an example. he returned from his solo flight over france and conde decide today throw a party in his honor and he came. he was mobbed, but he came. natika ended up rescuing him.

but this was the apartment, frequently a back drop for "vanity fair" and vogue, too. and i apologize for the quality. these are pictures of pictures in the family album. it gives you idea what it was like, on the right-hand side, these are the ballroom. and they appeared in various "vogue" or "vanity fair" magazines, guess what happened? in 1925, harold ross comes up with something called the new yorker. so, they get worried about "vanity fair," but turns out they decided to work with harold ross. now when i say that conde was the first to think of a lot of things, he was a pioneer in all new technologies, and he had the best printing plant in the entire united states in greenwich, connecticut and they did a deal with the new yorker to print the new yorker at conde's printing plant and basically it was a very

successful relationship for many years. it was only once the nenewhouses bought the new yorker that the two parted the conde publications. as you can see, they also have very stylish artists and this is natika in 1928-29 when she was still hostess in the main for conde. she introduced him to this man on the right, a chap called ivan, a white russian who had come over to the states. i started out as a runner on wall street, was always very fashionable, very debonnaire and natika insisted with her father, you will love this man, he's just like you. why is he like me? he thinks in numbers, he sees numbers as pictures. he understands how important it is to have a balance sheet that

works, to have all of the covers that worked, to understand what covers are attracting people, which ones don't attract people. i promise you, dad, he's a great guy. they met, they liked each other, but conde was thinking about something else. he had fallen in love with a woman the same age as his daughter. leslie foster. now, the picture on the lower right is leslie who's facing us and that's natika talking to her. he was afraid that people would make fun of them. she was afraid people would make fun of them. they were a real generation apart, but at the end of the day, they truly, truly loved each other and they got married right before the crash. this is a picture of them on honeymoon. as a matter of fact, he was so nervous that he invited all of his children to join them on honeymoon and also, petsavich.

he was thinking of someone reliable to take over from me. sorry, that's a really bad shot. that's the house in long island, the sun room that overlooks the sound and within the first year leslie gave birth to her daughter, little leslie, who is one of the main people who helped me on this book. little leslie is 89 today. so these two sly guys here, they look like bankers, don't they? well, they are. the chap on the left is waddell catchings. some may have heard of him and some may not. and the chap on the right is harrison williams. harrison williams owned the largest power generation company in the united states. catchings was the chairman of

goldman sachs and together they decided in 1928 that they were going to start telling people whose companies they wanted to acquire once the crash came, that they should load themselves up with debt, and one thing that conde always believed in is you go to the experts, let the experts advise you and yes, at the end of the day it's your decision, but you have to trust the experts, and these men were his friends and he trusted them and they loaded him up with too much debt so that when the crash came, conde was worthless. and conde nast publications was taken over by them and they tried to get conde out of the company. and they might have if it weren't for edna chase, not only would she not take the job, she would request it--

she would quit and make sure the staff would quit as well. conde was left in place, but he had to find out somebody to help with the debt. fortunately these guys overreached themselves and they were taken over by floyd oddlum who basically put the conde nast publications back on more of a level footing, but he said i will fell anybody -- i will sell to anybody who wants it because i want to make a profit. >> and he offered it to joe kennedy, and the hearst publications also in trouble and joe said no. he asked his good friend bernard baruke, he said no. everybody in america said no. and at exactly the same time. good cold carmel snow decides she's going to defect to harper's bazaar which of course was a terrible blow to conde and he never forgave her,

never, and she's the only person who did him wrong who he never forgave, but as you can see, there's a very famous new yorker diana friedland at harper's bazaar talking to carmel. by then her brother tom white is a manager of all the hearst companies and one of seven people who is bailing out hea hear hearst. at the same time. if that weren't bad enough. he has prostate cancer and a heart attack. and he had a radical prostate ectomy, a hard pardon to say, i'll get off that slide. and in basically poor health and he doesn't know what he's going to do. there's a lady he met at a cocktail party. he's still married to leslie and he's deciding whether he could ruin her life, she's not

going to be able to have more children and this lady comes in, and anybody know who she is? clair brokaw. and he met her at a cocktail party and he says go meet mrs. chase. she sees mrs. chase and come back in september, i'll see if i can hire you. clair being clair did the most amazing thing ever, she decided since conde was away and since edna was away, she would, as she put it, ooze her way into vogue. what does that mean? she reported for work and claimed she was the new girl and actually suddenly there was stuff on her desk and she started work and by the time edna came back, it was too late to fire her. so she went from that to becoming the managing director of "vanity fair" eventually,

but all within three years. now, there were lots and lots of rumors that conde was enamoured with her and he was going to leave his wife for her and everything else. frankly, that's a lot of hocum and she wouldn't have married conde anyway. but conde decide painfully to tell his wife leslie and she has to marry someone else. and he arranged her to meet a banker in england and they did fall in love and did get married, but as rex's children said to me, leslie and conde remained entirely devoted to each other for the rest of his life. they had two children together and of course, they were very happy. conde kept leslie, little leslie in new york with him since she could go to an american school, obviously it

was very difficult for big leslie as she called her in the family, to keep leslie in england at the time. meanwhile, dear clair decides she's going to marry henry loose. the picture on the left was taken only four months before the picture on the right. it was not a happy union. i just put this in for the fun of it because dorothy parker was such a breath of fresh air. so, yes, on hearing that clair booth loose was kind infear i don't remembers, and where does she find them? >> and they were going to bail out conde nast publications, and william barry-- william campbell and owned

magazines, the daily telegraph. the deal they did was a handshake deal. nobody would know, but the cameras, bailed them out, and conde stayed in charge of all of his magazines. i don't know anywhere today where that would happen. and so clair is now, by the 1936, 32, 34, 35, she's now in charge of "vanity fair" and she was, of course, a staunch republican as some of you may recall. she decide that as the election is coming up in 32, she's going to start lampooning fdr because the new deal and he was a horrible man. that didn't play very well because naturally fdr was very popular with the people. and so "vanity fair" subscriptions started to fall off. people weren't buying it as much on the news stand and this

continued through 1936 election. the finally, what happened, clair of course left when she married henry loose and helen brown norton took over very briefly as its managing director. conde had a brief affair with her. she wrote about him in her book "a stranger at the party", but i think he would have been very upset to find out that she was public sizing their sex life because he was a very quiet, a very shy man and he didn't want his private life to be talked about in public. and this is the last-- this is the last issue of "vanity fair" in 1936, february of 36, helen brown norton became helen lawrenceson as went to quite a lot for esquire and became a biographer for

clair as well. and "vanity fair" was subsumed into vogue and frank and conde were broken. it was their love affair with new york that had created "vanity fair" and they were just so upset, they were never going to be the same. now, one of the other things that "vanity fair" got wrong, it decided it would of course talk about mussolini and hitler, but their predictions for what they were going to be doing to europe and the world were entirely wrong. and of course, hitler invades the west in 1939 and by june, 1940, they'd take n over paris. conde is now an old man in many ways. his heart has been broken by the strain of trying to save his company. he's had several heart attacks he's kept secret. he kept secret his prostate condition. nobody knew anything except the

only his secretary, his daughter, and his butler. that was it. so now he's faced with the situation where all of the people that he hired in france, whom he'd loved, many of whom were very close friend were now in danger and he brought as many of them to safety as he could. on the right-hand side he brought over michelle the editor at vogue. there he's pictured after the war with lee miller. on the left was salonge, put in concentration camp and survived the war. his husband put into a different concentration camp did not. there was a lot in the book how conde desperately tried to save people. how he spent any cash that he had in sending care packages to the british as well, including at that point to his former wife.

conde died in september, 1942 of heart failure, essentially. and there's a very touching story that edna chase wrote about the last days with him which i do include in the book. he died virtually without any money. his first wife clarisse had an apartment on east 72nd street which conde had bought for her outright. they worked together for the benefit of the grandchildren and he was always wonderful to her and very generous. he and leslie remained very good friends after his death. frank was the only member of the "vanity fair" team who came out on top. he sold his conde nast shares on the eve of literally, i think on september the 8th, right before the stock market crash. so here we have conde's furniture, all of his personal effects, up for auction and

very sadly, even the family had to bit for the auction. they weren't allowed the smallest trinket. oh, dear, now i've lost my-- there it is. ivan who i mentioned before was named by conde as the new chief executive of the magazine empire. he wanted to marry marlena dietrich and she didn't want him. he was active in hollywood. here he's pictured on the left with some of his good friends, david niven and james stewart. and he was married, and stayed married and cut from the same cloth as conde. his word was his bond. whatever-- he hired people he felt were right for the job as opposed to famous, but he, too, realized that he had to sell the magazine empire when william

barry died. he was given the opportunity to find an american buyer and he opted for the newhouse family so of course the new era, ivan is still in charge of conde nast, he brings forward alex lieberman and of course, they poach to get from the hearst empire, diana friedman. the two look happy and i think this picture characterizes their relationship a lot better, don't you? [laughter] >> they didn't get on. she left, great mirra bella took over and after her, we have tina brown who came to in resurrect "vanity fair" and did a great job until 1992. the lady on the right needs no introduction to new york, even though she is british, i think, still or partially british.

but the one who really made "vanity fair" sing, every single song it used to sing was definitely graden carter. he again made "vanity fair" what it had been originally in other words, it wasn't that you would invite stars to "vanity fair" party at the oscars, it's that the stars had to be at the "vanity fair" party at the oscars or they weren't stars. that's a big difference and anybody who read "vanity fair" was allowed to go into that world. and it didn't only have movie stars, they wrote a fabulous article about the girl at collection, which is what i wrote about for hitler's art thief, they did what i would call important journalism in many different ways. and essentially, here we have their 100th issue. the 100 anniversary issue. never mind the 50 years it

wasn't in publication, okay? but that's what "vanity fair" was all about. and conde nast was a very shy man from very modest beginnings who actually brought business ethics to america, america's can-do attitude to europe and european style to new york. thank you. [applaus [applause] >> ladies and gentlemen, please wait for the microphones to be passed to you for your questions so we can record it and make sure that speak clearly and directly into the microphone. thank you. >> come on, somebody must have

a question. gentleman here. >> who currently has the apartment at 1040-- i'm sorry? oh. who currently has the house on long island and the apartment at 1040 park? do you know? >> i don't know. i asked leslie, who bought-- who actually owns the house now at sands point and she didn't know. so, but i can tell you what happened to 1040. it's a very sad story. it was a 32 room, story, duplex apartment with an enclosed balcony all the way around. magnificent. it could not be sold. and it was eventually, after about five years, actually, more than that, 1948 it was subdivided back into three

separate apartments and no longer duplex. natika useded to go there often with her daughter to paint because it had fantastic light in it and her daughter used to dance her ballet on the dance floor. that part is also in the book, but unfortunately, it didn't remain. it's a pity. >> thank you. >> in greenwich there are two very beautiful granite stone pillars where i assume the printing plant was. >> yes. >> who owns those the city of greenwich or town of greenwich or is it private property? >> i believe the town of greenwich have asked for them to remain in place and they've taken over the care and maintenance. essentially the printing plant which was a most extraordinary place, i think 400 acres

originally, that had been scrub land and they turned it into the most beautiful park and they were printing for about 25 of america's most important magazines at the time. it was sold after the newhouses bought conde nast publications and i'm pleased that it was after conde's life because it would have been a tremendous sadness to him. it probably would have killed him if "vanity fair" hadn't gone a long way toward that already, but i'm almost certain that it's the city -- the town of greenwich that owns them. >> thank you. they're very beautiful and they are maintained. >> they are gorgeous, yes. >> thank you. what is one of the stories that you heard that most surprised you in your research for the book? >> oh.

i think that it was the story about leslie and conde and why they decided to divorce. i had a bizarre connection with the bensons. the benson side of the family. my husband worked for many years for benson as a banker. we gave up investment bankening 2005. so we weren't part of the bad stuff. so, anyway, he-- i knew about him and i knew that he was quite a swashbuckling character. unfortunately, what was so good was that leslie's half brothers, robin and david, gave me access to their father's diary about when he had met leslie and how he was afraid that he was falling in love with a married woman and she was afraid she might be falling

in love with him. but they hadn't actually realized that conde had sent her over to england to meet her on purpose. they always say if you love somebody a lot, you have to be willing to let them go and in conde's case he was not only willing to let her go, but he felt that that was the only way she could have a life. he was afraid that she had married an old man, yes, they loved each other, but frankly, it wasn't a good life for her, she needed to have a different life. and it was his selflessness on top of the fact that he was this terribly ethical person that made me say, oh, i wish i had known him. there are so few people around like that. it would have been lovely to have actually met him, but meeting his children and his grandchildren and great-grandchildren has been my solace, i suppose. thank you:

this lady here in the front. >> can you please stand? >> oh, i'm sorry. >> can you tell us a little bit more about the newhouses, what they're doing with conde nast? >> i don't know, did everybody hear the question? okay. that she asked if i could tell us a little bit more about the newhouses and what they're doing with conde nast. the very short answer is no. simply because when i was being vetted by conde nast as to whether or not i was a fit person to go into their archives, they asked me one question, who are you writing about? and i said conde nast. are you going to be writing about anybody who's living? and at the time in you newhouse was arrive and i said i like

writing about dead people. and i think that people didn't want to end with the sadness of conde dying and in the book the empire lived on. there are an awful lot of changes at conde nast and at all the newhouse publications. obviously, the world is spinning at such a rate right now that print magazines are difficult for people to make any kind of a profit on, but when you're a privately held company like advanced publications is, it's very difficult for anybody outside to understand. there were lots of rumors around graden carter's quitting when he did. there have been huge changes in personn personnel. i think what they're trying to do is very simply make it profitable and keep all of the magazines in print as well as

on-line. whether they'll succeed, i don't know. it's -- it's a bewildering world in media right now and i think if conde were alive today, he would be totally beside himself. okay. does that help? >> yes. >> okay, good. >> last question. >> at the peak of his empire, what was the publication? what were the publication numbers in terms of readership and buying? >> okay, this is -- at the peak of the empire, it was probably around five million, but you have to understand that in that five million you've got offices that had them out on their tables when people were in the

waiting rooms and doctor's offices and what have you. so you would probably multiply that by five. okay. thank you. [applause] >> thank you, everybody. thanks for coming. [applaus [applause]. [inaudible conversations] >> a fascinating insight into conde nast the man and conde nast the empire and it was engrossing and i feel that we like we were emerged in cafe society and i thank you so much for that. >> thank you. >> on the occasion like this, we would like to make a presentation to you and to do so is our executive director.

victoria. >> thank you. >> and i join also in saying, it was so thoughtfully put together and we all can't wait to read the book and thank you for your very thorough research and for really, you could tell you really loved your characters. so, on behalf of the society and trademan 1785 we express our gratitude to suzanne, for the landmark lecture series, on behalf of the society, thank you very much. >> thank you. [applaus [applause]. we can already tell there's another book inside of you. we have amade you a lifetime member to our library whose

archives go back to 1785 and we have new york times best seller so i'm sure you'll find something. so come back. [laughter] >> since you say that, the next book is about somebody else who's also known in america. i've gone back to the dark side. sorry. it's called "the ambassador" and it's about joseph p kennedy as ambassador to britain, 1938-1940. 1938-1940. >> we look forward to it. thank you. [applause] >> i want to thank you all for coming this evening and i want to remind you that this book is for sale and susan would be happy to autograph it and i hope you'll also join us now for a glass of wine and i'm sure susan will be happy to answer more questions. thank you so much for coming this evening. [applaus [applause] >> you're watching a special

edition of book tv. airing now during the week while members of congress are in their districts due to the pandemic. tonight the digital world, first, michael strain discussing now the future of success is bright in his book "the american dream is not dead", then timothy carney on his book "alienated america", looking how the american dream is less attainable. later nicholas christoph, and dunn working class and rural america. enjoy book tv now and over the weekend on c-span2. >> the president just released in paper book from public affairs presents biographies of every president organized by their ranking in our much cited historian survey. c-span.com/the presidents