Way back in the mid-90s when magazines practically grew on trees and American

prints had an idea. John wanted to establish George magazine early on as like a

real editorial you know kind of powerhouse. You know, he's JFK Jr. obviously but

it was also like this new genre of magazine that no one had ever done before.

In the beginning it everybody wanted to be edited by John. I mean partially

because they wanted to see what kind of editor he was for the more seasoned

writers. But you know it was like of course it's JFK Jr. I want him to look at

my piece. I want to hear what he has to say. I want his handwriting on my

piece. I want his edits on there. We had Norman Mailer write for us Nicholas

Lemmon I think wrote for us. So it was it was trying to get that New Yorker level

writer to participate. Which is why for the very first issue it made perfect

sense to recruit a marquee writer someone synonymous with both political

heft and style to wax rhapsodyk about the magazine's namesake George Washington

no matter the price tag. I remember like we were just hearing whispers because

this was like supposed to be the centerpiece. You know they paid some crazy amount

of money for it. Let's say it was like $50,000 was something right just insane.

And it had been brokered by you know some big agent. And they get it and it's

crazy bad. It was unpublishable and it got killed.

From Justin Harmon and audio Chuck this is killed. The podcast that brings

dead stories back to life. Episode 10. The magazine The inaugural issue of any

magazine is hectic. There are dashed cover tries, skittish advertisers and the

tacit agreement between all staffers that this is full stop the most important

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