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Articles
New titles by local authors (Nob Hill Gazette, January 2012)
Many Mad Men, one pioneering woman (Circus magazine, issue 3, Dec. 2010)
First woman magazine publisher: Leda Sanford's 'Pure Moxie' moved moguls (Idaho Mountain Express, Sept. 7, 2011)
She's got moxie (The Weekly Sun, Sept. 7, 2011)
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New titles by local authors
(Nob Hill Gazette, January 2012)
(From "On the Write Track: It's full stream of consciousness ahead for Marin's authors!")
Pure Moxie: A Memoir by Leda Sanford. iUniverse, Inc. 125 pages. $13.95
Such a slim volume for someone who's led such a long and interesting life (after all, Miley Cyrus's autobiography is 288 pages)—then you realize Pure Moxie is no doubt just like the author: smart, funny, candid, to-the-point and, of course, slender. Leda Sanford, 77, became the first woman publisher of a major American magazine when she was named head of American Home in 1975. Although she was able to redirect the staid old publication toward the "liberated woman" and circulation rose, Sanford was unable to save it, and within a couple of years the magazine folded into Redbook. Sanford was only just beginning though, and her memoir recounts her ups and downs in running periodicals such as Chief Executive, Attenzione and Modern Maturity. Along the way there were affairs with married men, conflicts with co-workers, family issues and meals in some really fancy restaurants. She skips the boring bits—there is no droning on about cost per thousand or shipping rates. And in the end she falls in love with Sausalito.
The result is a book that is both a nostalgic look back (it's dedicated to Betty Friedan) at the post-Mad Men era—when General Motors and magazines were a big deal—and a nod toward the future, especially for increasingly creaky baby boomers, as Sanford became something of a visionary on promoting a new idea of aging and re-invention late in life.
One thing is clear: If you happen to see Leda Sanford at a luncheon, do what you can to get a seat next to her. She is fearless when she tells her tales.
—J.E. Vader
Many Mad Men, one pioneering woman (Circus magazine, issue 3, Dec. 2010)
By Pat Lowe, London
It's interesting and salutary to be reminded of how things were for women in business only a relatively few years ago. The shock of finding a woman in a position of genuine responsibility must have been like finding a giraffe in the room, and would have been accompanied by the immediate knee-jerk reaction of Whose mistress or daughter is she? Fortunately the world has grown up: even Republicans now appoint women in positions of great responsibility. The shock today would be in discovering that the editor or publisher of a serious women's magazine is a man.
Although we may consider that we were slightly more advanced in the UK as we had already had a huge cultural change in the sixties, the advent of Tina Brown wasn't until the late seventies, a couple of years after Leda Sanford had led the way in Manhattan.
All of us in advertising are fascinated by the history of Madison Avenue and this book is a valuable part of that story.
First woman magazine publisher: Leda Sanford's 'Pure Moxie' moved moguls (Idaho Mountain Express, Sept. 7, 2011)
By Jennifer Liebrum
Express Staff Writer
Leda Sanford was a revolution inside the movement called feminism, meant to obtain equal rights for women, a condition that still eludes even this generation.
But it's not for lack of trying. And Sanford's book is a quirky, sexy romp about a moxie-advantaged woman's escape from the dutiful wife role to make a difference for women everywhere through her then-unprecedented role as publisher of a number of major national shelter publications. A "shelter" magazine is a periodical publication with an editorial focus on interior design, architecture, home furnishings and often gardening.
Sanford will be in Ketchum to speak about her experiences. She self-published the confessional memoir through iUniverse. Once one reads it, it's clear why this is not a woman who waits for someone to do it for her. This is her second book, the first being a collection of inspirational columns called "Look for the Moon in the Morning."
Click here to read Idaho Mountain Express' Q&A with Sanford
She's got moxie (The Weekly Sun, Sept. 7, 2011)
By Karen Bossick
The Weekly Sun
It's the stuff of romance, scandal and drama. Leda Sanford's "Pure Moxie," that is.
The first female publisher of a national magazine, Sanford abandoned a secure yet "bored" suburban home life in the 1960s in exchange for life on the edge as a top magazine editor and publisher in the male-dominated Manhattan magazine publishing world she calls "the Mad Men period of magazine publishing and advertising."
And she'll tantalize an audience at The Community Library with her recollections tonight at 6 p.m., with a book signing with Iconoclast Books to follow.
In 1975 Sanford became the first female publisher of "American Home," a major U.S. magazine with a circulation of more than a million that eventually folded into "Redbook."
It ushered her into a world of jet-setting opulence that included private planes, five-star hotels, a state dinner at the White House and even a headline-making affair. It also unleashed her onto a staff in revolt —a staff of corporate-type men who had Stepford Wives waiting for them with dinner each night.
After her stint with "American Home," she directed the creation and reinvention of such magazines as "Bon Appetit," "Chief Executive," "Attenzione," AARP's "Modern Maturity" and "Get Up and Go!" as she trained her focus on baby boomers and re-invention with aging.
" 'Pure Moxie' is a memoir that reads like a best-selling novel," said Michael Rybarski, co-founder of Age Wave Target Marking and author of "StartUp Smarts." "Some readers may wonder if all of this could really have happened, but the world of American magazine publishing was a frontier in the 1970's and Leda was one of its leading pioneers. A business success story, an adventure, and a racy read all wrapped in one, 'Pure Moxie' is an absolute page-turner, with an inspiring moral."
Sanford, who was born in Tuscany but raised in the Bronx, has also written a book of inspiration columns titled "Look for the Moon in the Morning."
She currently lives in Sausalito, Calif.
LEDA SANFORD SPOKE recently to a women's group where she lived what she calls "my first life."
That was as a suburban housewife and mother in the early 1960s, a life she abandoned to take on the male-dominated world of magazine publishing in Manhattan.
"These women invited me to speak, and I did it because I felt emotionally responsible," she said. "I was trying to explain to them how I felt and why I would leave a nice home, a good husband and two beautiful children. It wasn't that I disliked my life, but I had this feeling of wanting more."
Sanford, now 77 and living in Sausalito, went on to become the first woman publisher of a major national magazine, a glass-ceiling-breaking career she writes about in her self-published new memoir, "Pure Moxie," which she dedicates to Betty Friedan, author of "The Feminine Mystique" and co-founder of the National Organization for Women (NOW).
"Her career serves as a guide for any woman who longs for a second chance and wants to discover her own path to self fulfillment," said a spokesperson for Book Passage in Corte Madera, where Sanford will appear on Dec. 11.
Robin Wolaner, founder of Parenting Magazine, calls "Pure Moxie" "a breezy romp through a trailblazing life. Leda Sanford didn't pull punches in her career, or in this entertaining read."
Through chutzpah and what could be called "pure moxie," Sanford landed the job of publisher of American Home, a failing women's magazine that she was determined to turn around by replacing the traditional women's magazine formula with one focused on an emerging liberated woman.
"I was on fire from reading Betty Friedan and Gloria Steinem," she recalled. "I had this calling. It was like a mission. I was going to create a new magazine for women, and I was never afraid to push the boundaries. I didn't want to do the magazine as it had been done. It needed more sparkle. I had nerve and said what I thought."
The problem was she faced a staff in revolt, a staff made up mostly of men who were similar to the Madison Avenue guys in the TV series "Mad Men" -- corporate types who wore coats and hats and took the train from the city to Westchester, where their Stepford Wives were waiting for them with dinner ready.
"And here I was standing up in meetings and talking about the new woman, which they were afraid was their wife," she sighed.
For reasons that had little to do with Sanford's revolutionary concept for American Home, the magazine folded three years later, unable to compete for circulation and ad revenue with bigger name women's magazines like Good Housekeeping, Red Book and the Helen Gurley Brown-led Cosmopolitan.
But it was good while it lasted. In "Pure Moxie," Sanford writes about her heady experiences as one of the first women to occupy a corner office and enjoy an opulent lifestyle of private planes, five-star hotels, daytime drinking, a state dinner at the White House. She bares all -- her divorce, trysts and headline-grabbing affair.
"I am very frank, too frank for my children," she admitted. "My son's wondering whether he should let my grandchild read the book. But I felt that if I'm writing this book to help other women, women who have the same feelings I had, then I have to be honest. I'm not writing a fairy tale."
American Home may have failed, but it launched Sanford's impressive career. She went on to help steer the fortunes of magazines such as Bon Appetit and Attenzione, where she won the Society of American Editors award for best designed magazine.
Just when she was being told that she was getting too old for the youth-oriented magazine business, she became advertising director in 1989 of AARP's Modern Maturity magazine, with a circulation of 22 million and gross revenues of $70 million.
"By everybody's standards, I had arrived," she remembered. "It was at the biggest magazine in the world with the biggest budget in the world. I was so excited about working on something that would help people as they aged, that would change the image of aging in America, to get rid of the stereotypes."
Once again, though, she ran headlong into hidebound tradition, an entrenched staff who saw change as a threat.
"The people were there because it was like working for the post office," she said. "You don't have to worry, you're not going to be challenged. They were counting the days until they could retire."
In "Pure Moxie," Sanford savages AARP's "tyrannical" ad-standards department, which prohibited ads for funeral services, wheelchairs, pharmaceuticals and even incontinence products -- anything they saw as promoting a negative image of the elderly.
Her experience with AARP is even more galling because she sees age discrimination as the biggest issue facing working people as they grow older.
"You hit 50 and you hit a wall," Sanford said. "To me, it's the age discrimination that still persists, and it persists more for women. I don't know how you'll change that because there are so many people out of work, both male and female, and so many people worrying about getting another job, or if they can go any higher on the ladder. So I'm glad my book is coming out now because I hope it gives people courage."
After leaving AARP in 1992, Sanford said goodbye to the East Coast and moved to Sausalito, a town she had fallen in love with when she had passed through Marin County on business. Sausalito reminded her of Italy, where she was born, so she ignored her New York friends who warned her that "those people out there are hippies. They wear Birkenstocks and do drugs."
"It's the prettiest place I ever saw," she gushed. "I always had it in my mind that one day I would retire here, and I would sit by the sea and I would write, which is what I do. The only thing they were right about is the shoes."
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