AOPA Pilot Magazine - March 2008 - 74

From 1939 through 1958, “The AOPA Pilot” was published as an insert in Flying magazine and its predecessor titles. Only AOPA members received magazines with inserts, and they had covers bearing the “AOPA Edition” logo. and Popular Aviation; in January 1943 its name was changed to Flying, the name it retains to this day. AOPA’s editorial representation in Flying grew as well. In April 1943 the last “AOPA Section” was run, and was replaced in May with “The AOPA Pilot.” This was the ﬁrst use of the title. “The AOPA Pilot” featured a number of safety campaigns in its editorial content. One of the most extensive was a 1946 series on low-altitude stalls and spins caused by buzzing (sound familiar?), which included entire pages devoted to photos of crashed airplanes. In the 1947 editions of “The AOPA Pilot” the association argued for mandatory shoulder harnesses—a rarity in those days. There were also articles that could be considered the forerunners of today’s Malfunction and Defect Reports. After AOPA formed a marketing agreement with Safe Flight Instrument Corp., “The AOPA Pilot” promoted the installation of Safe Flight’s new stall warning indicator—and sold it to members at a discounted price of $37.50. A sea change By 1948, it was clear that AOPA was on a roll. Membership hit the 50,000 mark and kept rising, which meant that more and more issues of Flying had to carry “The AOPA Pilot,” that each of those issues had to bear the special AOPA cover AOPA PILOT • 74 • MARCH 2008 stamp, and that those issues had to be mailed to a separate list consisting only of AOPA members. And all the while, the size of “The AOPA Pilot” in Flying kept increasing. To Ziff-Davis, this additional overhead must have been burdensome. Meanwhile, to keep up with the extra editorial duties, Hartranft hired the colorful and outspoken Max Karant to be both editorial director of “The AOPA Pilot” and AOPA’s assistant general manager. Previously, Karant was Flying’s managing editor. In a musical chairs move, Wilson then left AOPA to become Flying’s new editor in chief. By all these developments described so far, it’s easy to see how Flying, AOPA, and “The AOPA Pilot” were intertwined in both business and interpersonal relationships. According to what little remains of AOPA’s historical records, these relationships were to become tense. An encapsulated summary of the issues leading to AOPA’s decision to self-publish The AOPA Pilot appears in an August 28, 1956, memorandum of a meeting between Ziff-Davis’ Benjamin G. Davis and AOPA’s Charles P Miller (who would . soon serve as The AOPA Pilot’s managing editor.) At this time discussion centered on the 10-year publishing contract between Ziff-Davis and “The AOPA Pilot,” which was up for renewal in October 1957. Both parties said they want- ed to continue the business arrangement, but the memo makes it clear that their interests were diverging. Miller recounts Davis as saying that Flying was facing a postal rate increase, and that increases in the cost of producing the magazine meant that any increase in the size of “The AOPA Pilot” was “definitely out unless we [AOPA] would bear the cost.” Moreover, Davis said that AOPA was “at the end of the period where they could expect a ‘bargain’ rate for their magazine.” Rather, Davis argued, AOPA should pay more for ZiffDavis to publish “The AOPA Pilot.” To keep up with costs, Davis said that AOPA should increase the cost of membership, establish new, non-pilot classes of membership, and end AOPA’s free services to members. For its part, AOPA wanted to sell its own advertising, something that ZiffDavis deﬁnitely didn’t favor one bit. In the memo, Miller recalls Davis saying, “The only commercial value to the ZiffDavis organization, which our relationship held, was that of advertising.” Then Miller quotes Davis as making a comment suggesting that the idea of AOPA’s breaking away had already come up in earlier conversations. “If advertisers who run ads in Flying magazine were able to reach the AOPA membership in any other manner except through Flying, i.e., through publications of our [AOPA’s] own, it would completely nullify the advertising advantage that Ziff-Davis has,” Davis reportedly said. “And there would be absolutely no value in continuation of the AOPA-Ziff-Davis affiliation.” Davis went on to say that he wouldn’t have “any great trouble in maintaining subscriptions among pilots by going directly to AOPA members and getting the full subscription rate.” Davis also reportedly said that, “AOPA would never attempt to publish their own magazine if they were in their right mind.” After this meeting, AOPA leaders made up their minds. There would be no more arrangement with Ziff-Davis. The 17-year relationship that helped found and fund AOPA, solicit its first members, and give voice to the association, was over. AOPA would publish its own version of The AOPA Pilot, and do it with production values, a format, and an editorial style that would put it in direct competition with its former business partner—which stood to suddenly lose 63,000 AOPA subscriber-members.

AOPA Pilot Magazine - March 2008

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of AOPA Pilot Magazine - March 2008