Description
Collector's Note – Why This Issue Matters
December 7, 1968 is a publication date of considerable historical weight, and this New Yorker issue documents it with the specific, sustained intelligence that distinguished the magazine's engagement with its most turbulent decade. The year 1968 had been the most violent and politically devastating in postwar American history — the assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy, the Chicago Democratic Convention riots, the Tet Offensive, and the election of Richard Nixon had collectively produced a year that American culture was still actively processing when this December issue arrived. Arthur Getz's Christmas cover — Getz was one of the New Yorker's most accomplished and longest-serving cover artists, his work spanning from 1943 through the 1990s — would have carried the specific emotional weight of that context: a seasonal image of warmth and continuity produced at the close of the most disrupted year of the decade. The New Yorker's Christmas issues were among its most commercially significant and most widely read annual editions, and a December 7, 1968 issue anchored by a Getz cover represents the publication at a specific historical juncture — the cultural and literary conversation of 1968's final weeks, shaped by everything that year had been. For collectors building an archive of New Yorker issues from the turbulent 1960s, this December 1968 edition is a primary document of American literary culture navigating the close of the decade's most consequential year.
The documented table of contents preserved in the listing provides a bibliographically specific record of what this issue contained, and several entries carry particular historical and research significance. The "U.S. Journal: Wilmington" feature on page 190 is historically significant in a way that rewards specific attention. Wilmington, Delaware in December 1968 was under National Guard occupation — the occupation had begun in April 1968 following the riots that erupted after Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination and continued through the entirety of the year, becoming the longest domestic military occupation of an American city since the Civil War. A New Yorker U.S. Journal piece on Wilmington in December 1968 is therefore a primary document of one of the most extraordinary and least-discussed episodes in American civil rights and civil liberties history, produced at the specific moment when that occupation was still ongoing and its implications were still being actively contested. The "Annals of Medicine" piece on page 207 reflects the sustained medical and scientific journalism that distinguished the New Yorker's long-form reporting tradition, and the full cultural criticism package — theater on page 139, cinema on page 200, musical events on page 236, books on page 240 — constitutes a comprehensive primary source record of what the New Yorker's critics were engaging in the final weeks of 1968. Collectors researching New Yorker issues from 1968 will find this December edition one of the year's most specifically documented and historically resonant entries.
Arthur Getz's long association with New Yorker cover design gives his Christmas covers a specific place within the publication's visual history that merits attention from collectors focused on the magazine's artistic tradition. Getz joined the New Yorker in 1943 and produced covers for the publication for nearly five decades, his work characterized by a warm observational quality — urban streetscapes, seasonal scenes, the specific visual textures of New York life in mid-century — that gave his seasonal covers a documentary as well as decorative function. A December 7, 1968 Getz Christmas cover is a primary visual document of that tradition at a specific historical moment, capturing the holiday aesthetic of late-sixties New York in the visual language of an artist who had been documenting its character for a quarter century. The December 7 date also carries its own historical resonance — the anniversary of Pearl Harbor, twenty-seven years past by 1968, was still a date whose meaning was present in the consciousness of any American reader who had lived through the war.
About the Publication
The New Yorker was founded in 1925 by Harold Ross and has been published continuously ever since, establishing itself as the most consistently distinguished general-interest literary and cultural magazine in American publishing history. By December 1968 it had been publishing for forty-three years under the editorship of William Shawn, who had succeeded Ross in 1952 and whose tenure had deepened the publication's commitment to long-form journalism, literary fiction, and cultural criticism while maintaining the humor tradition that had defined it from the beginning. The New Yorker's engagement with 1968 had been among its most sustained and serious editorial commitments — its reporting on Vietnam, civil rights, and the year's political crises had produced some of the most significant journalism published anywhere in the American press. The December 7, 1968 issue represents the publication at the close of the most demanding year of its recent history, its Christmas cover and holiday shopping guide existing in direct juxtaposition with the Wilmington occupation report and the full range of cultural criticism that sustained the literary conversation through the season.
Key Highlights Inside
- Arthur Getz Christmas cover — a primary visual document of one of the New Yorker's most accomplished and longest-serving cover artists producing his annual seasonal contribution at the close of 1968, representing five decades of Getz's observational urban visual tradition applied to the specific holiday moment of the year's most turbulent December.
- "U.S. Journal: Wilmington" on page 190 — a documented piece of New Yorker long-form journalism on Wilmington, Delaware during what was at the time of publication the longest domestic National Guard occupation of an American city since the Civil War, constituting a primary source record of one of the most significant and least-discussed episodes in American civil liberties history during the post-King-assassination months of 1968.
- "On and Off the Avenue: Christmas Gifts" on page 154 — the holiday shopping guide that was among the most widely read annual New Yorker features, providing a primary documentary record of the consumer culture and gift recommendations that the magazine's affluent, culturally engaged readership was being addressed with in December 1968.
- "Annals of Medicine" on page 207 — the New Yorker's long-form medical journalism tradition represented in this specific issue, reflecting the publication's consistent commitment to bringing the intellectual rigor of its literary journalism to bear on scientific and medical subjects for a general educated readership.
- Theater criticism on page 139, cinema column on page 200, musical events on page 236, and books on page 240 — the complete cultural criticism architecture of a December New Yorker, documenting what the magazine's most respected critics were engaging across performing arts, film, music, and literature in the final weeks of 1968 and constituting a comprehensive primary source record of the New York cultural calendar at the year's close.
- Football on page 198 and The Race Track on page 235 — the sports journalism that the New Yorker integrated within its cultural criticism framework, reflecting the publication's consistent editorial judgment that sporting life was as worthy of its analytical intelligence as theater or literature, documented here in the specific sports calendar of early December 1968.
Condition & Rarity
New Yorker issues from December 1968 are approaching their fifty-eighth year of existence, and the condition landscape for surviving copies reflects both the general attrition of that age and the specific collecting significance of Christmas issues, which were among the most widely distributed and most actively read editions of any given year. Very Good condition with only light edge wear is an honest and strong grade for a fifty-seven-year-old weekly literary magazine, indicating a copy that retains full structural integrity, displays cleanly, and shows no significant cover damage or interior page loss beyond the minimal evidence of its age. The Getz Christmas cover — the primary visual asset of this issue for display-focused collectors — is preserved in this condition with sufficient clarity to convey both the illustrator's work and the magazine's visual identity. The plastic protective sleeve provides ongoing archival protection for a publication whose staple-bound format benefits from protection against the cover separation and page stress that unprotected storage produces over nearly six decades. Collectors evaluating surviving examples of this issue should prioritize the Getz cover image integrity, the completeness of the Wilmington U.S. Journal piece, and overall structural soundness as primary condition criteria.
Looking for More Issues Like This?
A Very Good copy of the December 7, 1968 New Yorker with an Arthur Getz Christmas cover, a documented Wilmington occupation U.S. Journal piece, and the full cultural criticism table of contents preserved is a specifically documented late-sixties literary magazine find — Christmas issues from the New Yorker's most historically turbulent decade in confirmed strong condition attract consistent interest from multiple collector communities. If this issue is no longer available, the full New Yorker collection at OriginalMagazines.com is the most comprehensive place to browse surviving issues from across the publication's history and locate other Arthur Getz covers, Shawn-era editions, or significant issues from the magazine's remarkable 1960s run. The 1968 magazine collection brings together surviving issues from across that year's major publications for collectors working to document the full breadth of American print culture during the most consequential year of the decade.