When Cultures Clash

By NANCY GIBBS

Anyone interested in the doings of the Lolo tribes-people, the Tarahumara Indians, or the Berbers, Bedouins and Bushmen knew just where to look. Likewise, those curious about "The Geographical Distribution of Insanity in the U.S." (1903) or "Pelican Profiles" (1943), or anyone "In Quest of the World's Largest Frog" (1967), had a handy reference guide. For most of its 102 years, National Geographic has been a colorful coffee-table companion for armchair explorers, roaming the world with rose-colored glasses and bringing back a cheery album of natives at play. But last week the abrupt firing of veteran editor Wilbur Garrett left staffers -- and readers -- wondering where the magazine might be headed next.

Garrett's dismissal followed months of hallway rumors, infighting, standoffs, bluffs and clashes between the fiercely independent editor and his predecessor, Gilbert Grosvenor, now president and chairman of the National Geographic Society. Scion of the founding family, Grosvenor follows in the footsteps of his great-grandfather, Alexander Graham Bell, in running the world's largest nonprofit scientific and educational institution.

The two men had been friends and colleagues for 35 years, but when Grosvenor took over the society and Garrett took charge of the magazine, they faced off over budget cuts, editorial control and their strategies for holding on to the society's 10 million members (please, not subscribers). To attract younger readers, Garrett, 59, wanted National Geographic to embrace the news and shed its reputation as a moss-backed wishbook where adolescent boys once made the acquaintance of bare-breasted women. A photographer and journalist himself, Garrett began publishing stories about the Exxon Valdez, the fall of the Berlin Wall, the effects of acid rain, and life in East Harlem. Despite his innovations, circulation remained flat during Garrett's tenure, after having almost doubled during the previous ten years.

Some speculated that Grosvenor resisted long, analytical stories, preferring National Geographic's traditional franchise of anthropology, travelogues and scenic montage. Yet it was under his tenure as editor in the '70s that the magazine first tiptoed toward relevance by running stories on Harlem and South Africa and the Quebec separatist movement. More likely, the clash had to do with personalities -- or money. In recent years the society has branched out into book publishing, a TV program, a travel magazine and a research journal. The strain on cash flow triggered cost cutting and staff reductions, leaving Garrett's writers and explorers with less luxuriant expense accounts than usual and strict project budgets to meet. Grosvenor favored shorter stories, focusing on the U.S., in place of the lavish globe-roaming epics of yore.

The final blow came when a committee of staffers, ironically formed by Garrett, presented Grosvenor with a report calling for some changes to allow for the advancement of the young and the restless and to improve the management of the magazine. Grosvenor's reply was to name William P.E. Graves, 63, to replace Garrett at the top editor's post, thus seeming to signal a return to more predictable stories and modest aspirations. Said one depressed insider: "It's like a morgue over there right now, and everybody's just wandering around in a stupor wondering what they're going to do next."

Garrett, meanwhile, is not talking. But his biography quotes him as saying two years ago that "if I were unemployed, I would probably start a winery." By now, there are probably more than enough sour grapes to start the first batch.

With reporting by Michael Riley/Washington