Otto Fuerbringer | |
|---|---|
 Otto Fuerbringer in 1982 | |
| Born | September 27, 1910 St. Louis, Missouri, U.S. |
| Died | July 27, 2008(2008-07-27) (aged 97) Fullerton, California, U.S. |
| Alma mater | Harvard University (AB) |
| Occupation(s) | Journalist, editor |
| Employers | |
| Spouse | Winona Gunn (m. 1940) |
| Children | 4 |
| Father | Ludwig E. Fuerbringer |
Otto Fuerbringer (September 27, 1910 – July 28, 2008) was an editor for the American news magazineTime.
Fuerbringer was born inSt. Louis, Missouri, U.S. toLudwig and Anna Zucker Fuerbringer. His father was a Lutheran minister. He was the youngest of five children.[1] His brother wasAlfred Fuerbringer, a Lutheran seminary president.[2] He later attendedHarvard University, where he was president ofThe Harvard Crimson.[3][4]
After graduating from Harvard in 1932, he started working for theSt. Louis Post-Dispatch, before being hired byTime in 1942.[5] Reaching the rank of assistant managing editor in 1951, he was appointed managing editor in 1960.[6] Later, as head ofTime Inc.'s magazine-development group, he also introducedPeople andMoney magazines.[5] He did much to rejuvenate what was a rather austere publication, and once famously said of the journalism his staff did that "It only has to be truethis week."[7] Though a social conservative, Fuerbringer nevertheless did much to focus the magazine's attention on thecounter-culture and the political and intellectual radicalism of the 1960s.
During Fuerbringer's tenure as editor, the magazine's circulation rose from three to five million.[1] His best known act as editor was probably his April 8, 1966 cover story "Is God Dead?"[8] In the accompanying article he explored the role of religion in an increasingly secular society, and investigated a trend among contemporary theologians to writeGod out of the field oftheology.[5] Fuerbringer had initially been a supporter of theVietnam War, but in 1968 he wrote aneditorial conceding that the war was unwinnable.[5]
Shortly before his death, in 2007, he wrote an autobiography, titled "On TIME".[1]
Fuerbringer married Winona Gunn in 1940. They remained married until his death 68 years later. The couple had two sons, Jonathan and Peter, and two daughters, Alexis and Juliana.[5]
Fuerbringer died inFullerton, California in a retirement home.[1] ThePulitzer Prize-winning journalistDavid Halberstam once said of Fuerbringer "He was the most controversial man withinTime magazine, immensely influential, perhaps the most influential conservative of his generation in journalism, but outside the magazine almost no one knew his name."[9]Time employees sometimes called him "Otto Fingerbanger" or "The Iron Chancellor" for his imperious demeanor.