Gloria Stavers

Gloria Stavers (1926-1983) was the editor in chief of 16 magazine. Her personality gave this teen celebrity magazine its stamp for many years.

Stavers is credited with being one of the first women rock and roll journalists, but male editors, detractors and those who scoffed at teen or celebrity magazines sometimes called her "Mother Superior Of the Inferior" [1]

Early Years

Very little is known of Stavers's childhood and adolescence. She was born Gloria Gurganus in Wilmington, North Carolina. She had married and divorced young, and had moved to New York to pursue a modeling career. For a time she was involved socially with the "jet set" and rumored to be involved romantically with baseball player Mickey Mantle. Health issues forced Stavers to give up modeling.

Stavers got her start at 16 Magazine in 1957 as a subscriptions clerk. She was initially paid 50 cents an hour. Stavers developed many of her ideas as to how the magazine should be run by reading the fan letters from preteenaged girls writing to various celebrities in care of the magazine. As she read those letters, she remember how she felt as a pre-teenager, and what she most cared about at that age.

Stavers did not possess a college degree, but she rose through the ranks to the position of editor in chief, where she had unprecedented access to many of the top recording acts of the day. Although 16 Magazine had a staff of reporters on both coasts, Stavers wrote most of the magazine's feature articles herself. She also served as the magazine's chief photographer, and shot numerous photographs of stars such as Paul Revere and the Raiders, Peter Noone of Hermans Hermits, and Jim Morrison, lead singer of The Doors.

Editorial Style

Stavers was known for being singleminded regarding the image of "her" magazine. Her main priority was giving her teenage female readerbase what they wanted, and what they wanted, according to Stavers, was the feeling of being "close" to their favorite stars. Stavers would receive more than 300 letters per day addressed to her from teenagers. She read every letter and took their words to heart, and then tried to use the magazine to address the concerns that were often written off as "silly" by adults.

As an editor, she eschewed serious or controversial subject matter for 16 Magazine interviews. Rather than asking a celebrity about social issues, she preferred to discuss more personal and lightly intimate topics such a celebrity's favorite color or meal or to ask him who his idea of whom a "dream date" would be. Her style of interviewing was referred to as the "40 intimate questions." Her first interview using that format was with the Canadian pop singer Paul Anka.

Staver, in her writings, attempted to make the celebrity appear approachable and "attainable" for her young readers. In short, the celebrity was a "surrogate boyfriend" for the reader. If the artist was married, in a long term relationship or was not heterosexual in orientation, that fact was never mentioned in the magazine.

Despite frequently using a teenzine shorthand for some words such as "fave" for favorite, and "cuz" for the word because, Stavers was a stickler for correct spelling and grammar.

Influence

In the 1980 movie, The Idolmaker, there is an unflattering portrayal of a mercurial "prima donna" teen magazine editor, based loosely on Stavers. According to some of her contemporaries, she tended to run roughshod over underlings, and she was known for her use of strong profanities and issuing ultimatums. However, Stavers was also known to threaten some of the "faves", too, if she didn't get what she wanted from them. In one instance, Staver allegedly threatened to print the full real name of Paul Revere if he didn't agree to make an appearance at a hospital to visit a dying girl. Revere's last name was Revere-Dick.

Despite her many detractors, Stavers had an admirer and defender in American Bandstand host, Dick Clark. He said of Stavers, "She had her finger on the pulse of what kids were thinking, which impressed me. We both, as adults, could "think young" and see what was interesting and ascertain what the future would bring in the next few months. Gloria helped American Bandstand, and the show helped 16. It was a two-way street."

There were many in the entertainment and publishing industries who believed that between Stavers and Clark, they had the power to "make or break" a teen idol. According to a 1967 Saturday Evening Post feature article, record companies frequently consulted Stavers as to how to best promote an artist, and would not make a decision until she said so. At that time, few women in any field weilded such power.

Stavers was rumored to have become romantically or sexually involved with several of the celebrties she interviewed. Stavers was one of Jim Morrison's long-term lovers, a fact that was ignored by Oliver Stone while making The Doors (film).

In her editorial content, Stavers seldom if ever was critical or unflattering regarding any celebrity. She preferred to focus on the "faves" positive qualities. She ignored those celebrities and musical acts whom she felt would not capture her readers interest, or those who failed to capture her personal interest. If the "fave" appeared to have fallen out of favor, than Stavers merely stopped covering that celebrity in the magazine, and then would find someone else to feature.

At times, Stavers did appear to push people to the forefront who appeared to be unlikely candidates for teen idol status, such as comedian Lenny Bruce, Star Trek actor Leonard Nimoy, and shock rock pioneer Alice Cooper. Stavers also began to experiment with new trends which she incorporated into the magazine. However, not everyone agreed with Ms. Stavers on the right direction for the magazine. According to a autobiography written by former teen idol Donny Osmond, Stavers and his mother, Olive Osmond, had a continual disagreement regarding the use of increasingly sexualized pin up pictures featuring her sons and other teen idols.

The Later Years

By the mid-1960's and throughout the early 1970s, Stavers was encountering fierce competition from other teen magazines such as Tiger Beat, as well as competition from other journalists now focusing their attentions on the rock music scene such as Patricia Kennealy and Jann Wenner of Rolling Stone magazine. In 1975, Stavers left 16 Magazine after a publishing dispute. After her departure from the mgazine, Stavers worked as a freelance writer and photographer, and she gathered information and outlined a biography about Jim Morrison. She also spent time learning about spirituality, particularly Buddhism.

In 1983, Stavers, a long term smoker, died of lung cancer at Presybterian Hospital in New York. She was 56 years old at the time of her death.

External links

The Singer, Not The Song. An article about Gloria Stavers and the rise of 16 Magazine [2]

Rockcritics.com article about what Gloria Staver's peers thought of her and her influence on rock journalism [3]