J. C. Leyendecker - Nominee

"A good cover has a distinct silhouette."

- J.C. Leyendecker

The man whose illustrations and style helped define America emigrated from Germany to Chicago at the age of 8.  After his apprenticeship to an engraving firm and schooling at the Chicago Art Institute, Joseph Christian Leyendecker enrolled in Académie Julian in Paris.  Upon his return to the states he went into business with his brother and quickly found success.  Leyendecker’s close association with ‘Colliers’ magazine (48 covers) and ‘The Saturday Evening Post’ (322 covers starting in 1899) helped establish the modern magazine cover as an art form.  As a pillar of ‘The Golden Age of American Illustration’ he dominated the magazine world two decades before Norman Rockwell.  Leyendecker illustrated the wholesome Americans on the Kellogg’s Corn Flakes box, as well as recruitment posters, war bonds, and other home front efforts during WWI; he also created the popular images most people associate with Santa Claus and the New Year’s Baby.  Many of Leyendecker’s illustrations featured young, handsome and muscular athletes, soldiers, and sailors, thereby introducing a valorous, though discreet, male homoeroticism into mainstream American advertising.  One of his largest clients was Arrow Collars and Shirts.  In 1903 Leyendecker met Charles Beach, a young model from Cleveland, who came became the Arrow Shirt model as well as his partner, cook, and business manager for the next 49 years.  By 1914 Leyendecker had accrued enough money to buy a 14-room mansion in New Rochelle, New York where he lived with his brother, his sister, and Beach.  It was at this beloved estate that he Leyendecker died of a heart attack in 1951 at age 77.  Charles Beach died less than a year later.  Echoes of Leyendecker’s signature aesthetic continue to define the portrayal of elegance in modern advertising.