"Teena Goes to Market": Seventeen Magazine and the Early Construction of the Teen Girl (as) Consumer

And this was really a wilderness time, it was like discovering a whole new country. Because there was no awareness -not only of teenagers -but there was no awareness of teenage girls, there was no awareness of how they dressed, or the clothes they needed. There wasn't even anyone producing clothes for this age group. There was no cosmetics being created for this age group. So it's hard to believe it, but at that time, it was totally ... new terrain. New territory, new country to be discovered. (Estelle Ellis, Promotion Director at Seventeen, 9/44-3/50; Personal Interview, 6/19/03) As hard as it is to imagine today when it can be argued that youth rules the culture, teenagers are really-at least as a social category-a rather recent cultural phenomenon. Psychologist G. Stanley Hall is most often credited with introducing the idea of adolescence as a specific (and troublesome) stage of life through his widely read 1904 text, Adolescence (Cook 127; Hine 4; Kett 6; Palladino 5). It was not until several decades later, around the 1940s, that the moniker "teenager" moved into wide circulation in the popular culture discourse (Palladino 93; Schrum 138). This was also the decade that saw teenagers become a distinct consumer category, with their own clothing and product lines being marketed to them (Cook 127). Not coincidentally, the 1940s were the "birth" and developmental years for Seventeen, the magazine that has since grown up to become the "queen" of the teen magazine genre. The economics of the magazine industry necessitated one of Seventeen's initial tasks: to introduce and then "sell" the teen girl to the business community. Its first promotional campaign, "Meet Teena," would prove instrumental in constructing teen girls as consumers -a legacy that remains with our culture today. The Birth of a Teen Queen As with most human births, two people -a man and a woman-were present at the conception and birth of Seventeen: publishing magnate Walter Annenberg and Seventeen's first editor, Helen Valentine. Early in 1944, Annenberg approached Valentine, a grandmother who had spent her entire adult life in the magazine industry and who was then working as the promotion director of Mademoiselle, with a business proposition. He offered her the editorship of his failing movie magazine, Stardom, with the mandate to revitalize it as a women's fashion magazine. Replying that she was not "the least bit interested" in such an endeavor, Valentine responded with an alternative: she would like to edit a "service" magazine directed at high school age young women (Cooney 183; Ogden 285; Reynolds 231; Valentine 5-6). She told Annenberg: "There's room today for a publication aimed at teen-agers. They have been neglected by the established fashion publications. Everyone treats them as though they were silly, swooning bobby soxers. I think they are young adults and should be treated accordingly" (Reynolds 231). Valentine quickly convinced Annenberg that teenage women needed a magazine of their own - and that they had the potential to become an important new consumer market segment. Upon the magazine's launch into the marketplace, Seventeen and its staffers treaded boldly into the cultural "wilderness" of teen culture, constructing the concept of the "teenage" girl in diverse venues and to different constituencies. In the actual magazine issues, they advised the high school reader on how to be an ideal "teen." But Seventeen was also instrumental in constructing the teen girl as a consumer through its education and instruction of adults, particularly those in the advertising and retail industries. Because the economic foundation of the magazine industry is built upon the financial resources of advertising, successful magazines must garner the "support" of business (Croteau and Hoynes 66; Kilbourne 34; McCracken 4; Zuckerman 26). Seventeen's young promotion director, Estelle Ellis, was charged with the job of liaison between the magazine and the business community, and she produced an extremely innovative promotion campaign that served as the formal introduction of the teen girl to business(men) -a match that would lead to a lucrative long-term relationship. …