Description
Collector's Note – Why This Issue Matters
This issue features cover art by Garrett Price, an artist whose association with The New Yorker began in the magazine's very first year and continued for nearly half a century, making him one of the longest-serving contributors in the publication's history. Price worked for over half a century for The New Yorker, drawing hundreds of cartoons and 100 covers in total, including two covers published in 1925, the magazine's debut year. His relationship with the publication extended from that founding year all the way to his last published work in 1974, spanning the magazine's entire formative and mid-century era. An October 18, 1947 cover by Price sits comfortably within the productive middle decades of that long tenure, at a point when his visual style and reputation within the magazine's roster of artists were both fully established. For collectors of The New Yorker's classic cover art, a confirmed Price cover from this period represents an authentic example of work by one of the publication's true founding-era contributors, still active and prolific well into the postwar years.
Price's path to The New Yorker ran through an unusually varied early career that gave his later cover work a distinctive observational quality. After studying at the Art Institute of Chicago, where he formed a lasting friendship with future New Yorker art editor James Geraghty, Price landed a position in the art department of the Chicago Tribune around 1916, beginning what would become a 63-year career as a cartoonist, illustrator, and painter. Price had also served during World War I as the editorial cartoonist for the Great Lakes Navy Bulletin before moving to New York to pursue freelance illustration work for the era's emerging magazines. In the early 1930s, he developed a half-page Sunday newspaper comic strip called "White Boy," which later shifted setting and was renamed "Skull Valley" before running until 1936, after which Price left the comics field entirely to focus on his New Yorker cartoon and cover work. By the time this October 1947 cover was created, Price had already moved well past that earlier comic-strip chapter into the cover-illustration work for which he is most remembered today.
Critical assessment of Price's New Yorker covers, particularly those from the years surrounding this issue, has emphasized a distinctive emotional quality not always associated with the magazine's more purely comedic cartoonists. Writer Thomas Powers has described Price's covers from this era as sometimes possessing what he called a stunning, wistful beauty, specifically highlighting examples such as a 1949 cover of a boy alone on a spring ball field sliding into home plate and a 1951 cover depicting a husband waiting in a car as his wife gathers flowers while a summer house is closed for the winter. Price spent much of his career living in the artistic community of Westport, Connecticut, sharing that setting with several other New Yorker cartoonists and contributors, a community that by some accounts was home to as many as seventeen of the magazine's regular artists at various points. A cover from October 1947 documents Price's work from squarely within this celebrated stretch of his career, offering a window into the quieter, more contemplative visual sensibility that distinguished his contributions within the magazine's broader roster, of particular relevance to anyone exploring our 1947 magazines collection.
About the Publication
The New Yorker has been published continuously since 1925 and built its reputation on a distinctive combination of long-form journalism, fiction, criticism, and cartoons, all wrapped in cover art that became one of the magazine's most recognizable signatures. Unlike many general-interest magazines of the era, The New Yorker's covers rarely featured photography or celebrity imagery, instead commissioning original illustrations from a roster of artists whose individual styles became closely associated with the publication itself. Its audience skewed urban, literary, and culturally engaged, and by the late 1940s the magazine had firmly established itself as a benchmark for sophisticated American prose and visual wit. The magazine's longtime art editor, James Geraghty, who held that role from 1939 to 1973, had himself been a personal friend of Price's since their shared student days at the Art Institute of Chicago, reflecting the close-knit professional community that shaped the publication's visual direction during this period.
Key Highlights Inside
- Original cover artwork by Garrett Price, one of 100 covers he produced for The New Yorker across a nearly fifty-year association with the magazine that began in its founding year of 1925 and continued until 1974.
- A confirmed publication date of October 18, 1947, placing this issue within the productive middle decades of Price's long tenure with the magazine, a period later singled out by critics for its distinctive emotional and observational depth.
- Cover artwork reflecting Price's broader visual sensibility, which writer Thomas Powers specifically credited with achieving a quality of stunning, wistful beauty in several covers from this general era of his career.
- Specific interior articles, named contributors, or feature content beyond the cover are unconfirmed for this issue; readers should consult the listing's photographs for the exact table of contents.
Condition & Rarity
This issue is described as being in very good condition, with only minor wear on the edges typical of its age, a grade reflecting a well-preserved copy nearly eight decades after its original publication. Minor edge wear consistent with careful handling and storage is a favorable condition outcome for a periodical of this age, particularly one bound with the lighter materials typical of weekly magazines from the 1940s. The cover itself, as the primary visual and collectible focal point for New Yorker issues featuring artists of Price's stature and longevity with the publication, is the element most closely scrutinized by collectors in this category, and its presentation should be assessed directly from the listing's accompanying photographs. For a periodical from this era, a cover in very good condition with only minor edge wear represents a strong example for collectors specifically seeking confirmed Price cover art from within his extensive body of work for the magazine.
Looking for More Issues Like This?
Original New Yorker covers by Garrett Price are of lasting interest to collectors and historians of American illustration alike, given his documented status as one of the magazine's earliest and longest-serving contributors and the distinctive emotional quality later critics have identified in his work. Our New Yorker collection is a great place to browse other available covers and issues from across the magazine's long publishing history, and our 1947 magazines collection offers a broader look at other publications from the same year for anyone building a collection around this specific period of mid-century American print culture.