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AND how has TIME changed editorially since the first issue? In its basic formula, TIME is still much the same. But through the yearsof depression and war and victory and breathtaking changethe approach to stories, the breadth of coverage, the visual appearance evolved gradually but greatly with history. Thus "Radio" found its way out of SCIENCE AND INVENTION into Radio & Television, and in 1958 moved into Show Business. The evolution throughout the magazine has been steady, never shattering.
In TIME'S early years, its new style of prose became a conversation piece inside and outside the journalism fraternity, and was widely copied and sometimes parodied. TIMEstyle became one word in the language. Like the rest of the magazine, that style has changed with the years. Most of what was fresh and persuasive about itand some of what was provocative and sometimes impudent about ithas remained. There is now no conscious infusion of a precise style of writing, but there is an abiding interest in style as an important part of our job. Other facets of our style have changed too. Our covers have advanced to include a wide variety of treatments by the best portraitists in the world. Our illustration has broadened, with greater use of color pages to make editorial points and wider freedom in the size, shape and display of black-and-white pictures. And our style of operationour timinghas accelerated to make us flexible to move fast and deep with the course of the news.
For all these changes, the basic aim to keep busy people informed remains, and is greatly intensified after these 40 years in which the things to be informed about and the complications surrounding them have grown virtually with each day. It is a sobering and at the same time exciting realization for us that week after week more ideas and opinions are circulated across the U.S. and around the world by TIME than by any other magazine—or any other means of communication. The ideas range from those of the highest magnitude (the mystique of Charles de Gaulle, the theology of Paul Tillich) to those of personal motivation (the trials of Richard Burton, the hopes of Cassius Marcellus Clay) to those of highest practicality (how better cars are built, better farms are run, or better dresses are designed). While TIME does not believe in bannering its exclusives, almost every story can fairly be said to contain facts and insights that the reader recognizes as information that he has not seen and does not get anywhere else. And wherever it is fitting, humor works its way in, even on the biggest issues, because of our belief that solemnity is no guarantee of the truth. Each issue of TIME contains thousands of facts and hundreds of judgments —an adult education course, a compendium of knowledge inviting readers each week into the company of educated men.