The first guest commentary, “Losing the President in the Presidency,” was written by Bill Moyers, who berated Richard Nixon for secluding himself in the White House on the eve of his re-election. Thus began what NEWSWEEK referred to as a “personal page of commentary to be written each week by a different guest columnist.”
“My Turners” haven’t dropped a beat since. They have castigated world leaders, railed against injustice, pushed for reforms, offered solutions for vexing problems, observed social phenomena, poked fun and made personal confessions. They tell us how to solve the national debt, they tell us what to do about rambunctious foreign countries, they tell us about racism and inflation and the state of the nation.
I’ve been a reader of “My Turn” all 20 years. The range of its subjects, the zing of its ideas, the feistiness of its contributors appeal to me. When I realized that its 20th birthday was coming up, I decided to do some research. Why has it worked for so long? Who have been its writers? What have they written about?
From its inception to today, “My Turn” has appeared in all but 56 issues of 1,046 regular editions of NEWSWEEK. That adds up to 990 articles from Nov. 6, 1972, to Nov. 2, 1992. (Actually, there were 993 contributors, because on three occasions two people shared the writing.)
Close to half of the columns (465) have been written on 15 basic subjects. As you might expect, national politics/government led all of them, at 113. The rest of the top five, totaling 202 columns, were devoted to business and the economy, international relations and foreign policy, medicine and health care, and education. The remaining 10 (on culture, sports, TV, crime, labor, civil rights, law, parenthood, nuclear power and taxation) averaged 15 on each subject.
In the past two years, columns on politics/government have waned drastically. Out of the past hundred issues, two thirds have dealt with completely different subjects. A few, like education, medicine and international relations, tend to be mined again and again, but others roam over such disparate subjects as aging, sexual harassment, dwarfism and censorship; euthanasia, telephone soliciting, family history and logging; self-help books, homelessness, farming and Appalachia.
The most typical “My Turn” contributor over the years is a white male of middle years who is a writer or professor or journalist. Detailed figures are revealing. Males predominate among the contributors: 758 men to 235 women, or 76 percent to 24 percent. However, contributions by women have increased steadily over the past few years, for example, to 42.5 percent so far in 1992. Of the total contributors, 43 were African-Americans (35 male, eight female). The total also includes a dozen Latino and Asian writers and a few Native Americans.
As might be expected, three fourths of the contributors range in age from the 20s to the 50s. The balance has been equally divided among younger and older contributors. The youngest was a 15-year-old African-American high-school student (Aug. 18, 1980). Others included youthful college freshmen and sophomores. The oldest have been in their 70s and 80s, among them Helen Hayes, who wrote “Reflections on Turning 80” back in Oct. 20, 1980.
Eight professions account for two thirds of all “My Turn” columns. After the writers, professors and journalists, who make up half, come lawyers, CEOs and editors, then doctors and teachers. But “My Turn” has also served as a forum for people in divergent walks of life: a welfare mother, construction worker, policeman, firefighter, farmer, nurse, convict, TV anchor, babysitter, welder, rabbi, bartender, mail carrier, carpenter, part-time secretary, GM line worker, film star.
Many contributors are multitalented, Consider colorfully sport-coated Heywood Hale Broun and his job description (March 5, 1973) as writer, actor, wit, TV sports reporter. Almost, but not quite, as impressive as the many admirable women described as “writer, wife, mother.” Ultimately, of course, what counts isn’t who you are or what you are. Rather, the strength, intelligence and appeal of your opinion matter. As for the way you write, incisiveness, clarity and wit all seem to help.
My nostalgic time-tripping also reminded me that some of the most enjoyable columns have been offbeat ones. Many are so charmingly idiosyncratic that they can’t be labeled. Like the greatness of dirt roads, the value of boredom, the honesty of auto shops. On househusbanding and instant gratification and lastborns and string bathing suits and riding a skateboard and secretarial work and baldness. On Polish jokes and the metric system and air conditioning and Cleveland and flirting and kvetching and Anne Frank and Christmas-card brag sheets.
Who could resist essays titled “My Neighbor Is Going to Kill Me,” “The Intellectual Taxicab Company,” “A Pink-Collar Worker’s Blues,” “Ronald Reagan as Indiana Jones,” “My Grandmother, the Bag Lady” or “Requiem for the Mad Inventor,” which opens with the question “Where have all the screwballs gone?”
So let’s light the candles for “My Turn’s” 20th, with thanks to all the women and men savvy enough to create these original essays and to all the editors who selected them. “My Turn” has given the many voices of our republic a chance to be heard. It provides a national forum, allowing even for the irrelevant and irreverent, that goes beyond the TV sound bite or the truncated letter to the editor. In sum, the column reveals how thoughtful the public is and indeed how eloquent its expression can be.
