TO OUR READERS

By NORMAN PEARLSTINE EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

SINCE ITS FIRST PUBLICATION ON March 3, 1923, some 3,700 issues ago, TIME has not only chronicled history as it has happened but also shaped world opinion and enlivened the intellect of its readers. That the magazine has been so successful at these pursuits for so long is due in large measure to its 13 managing editors, or "boss men," as the first one, Henry Luce, once called them. Each and every one has taken to heart what Luce said were the primary responsibilities of all Time Inc. editors: "To earn, maintain and to leave behind a great and good reputation as a journalist," and "to make some contribution to the general welfare."

With this week's issue, TIME welcomes its 14th managing editor: Walter Isaacson. He replaces James R. Gaines, who is moving up the masthead to become Time Inc.'s corporate editor. Gaines' experience as the only man ever to be the managing editor of three Time Inc. publications--PEOPLE, LIFE and TIME--makes him uniquely suited to oversee a wide variety of magazines as well as to advance Time Inc.'s growing interest in television. A man of many interests, Gaines is an accomplished classical pianist, the father of three (soon to be four) children, the author of one book (Wit's End: Days and Nights of the Algonquin Round Table) and the editor of another (The Lives of the Piano).

He played the instrument of TIME with panache, style and virtuosity. In his three years at the helm of our flagship, Gaines has given TIME both energy and purpose, and his keen nose for news and for talent have made a great magazine even greater. Many of his covers will live long after their issue dates: the 20th Century Blues, the Case for Killing Social Security, and the Black Renaissance, to name just three. During his tenure, TIME superbly covered the war in Bosnia, the Newt Gingrich revolution and its effect on American politics, the O.J. Simpson trial and, most recently, the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin, which happened a scant 24 hours before the magazine went to press.

In addition, Gaines expanded the TIME franchise by introducing TIME FOR KIDS, TIME DIGITAL and such online services as TIME DAILY. Yet he never lost sight of the magazine's primary mission. Says Gaines: "The new wave of instant news via broadcast TV, cable and the computer has created not a problem for Time, but an opportunity. Having all this access to news does not mean that people today are better informed; it just means they are ill informed about more things. If I'm right, the most important news function on the information highway will not be the provision of data but the sorting, synthesizing and editing of it. That is precisely the job Time was invented to do."

His successor might also be described as a Renaissance man. A onetime member of the Harvard Lampoon staff and a Rhodes scholar, Isaacson is equally at home in his native New Orleans, in London, where he began his career in journalism, in Washington, which he covered with distinction as a TIME political correspondent, and in New York City. Actually, he did feel a little lost after turning in his first story for TIME back in 1978. The lead of the piece, which began "Prior to taking office, Jimmy Carter...," was circled by then editor-in-chief Henry Grunwald (who had been TIME managing editor No. 9), who scrawled in the margin, "Prior is a God-awful word."

Isaacson overcame that early setback, rising to senior editor and then assistant managing editor at TIME. For the past three years, he has been the editor of new media for all Time Inc. publications, a position that has given him invaluable online and bottom-line experience. In that role, Isaacson supervised our magazines' development programs in cyberspace and helped launch both the Pathfinder Website, one of the largest content providers on the Internet, and LineRunner, a cable online service.

As well wired as Isaacson is, he is mindful of the magazine's heritage. "Any new editor of TIME has to proceed by going back to the future, reaching back to the best of the magazine's traditions in a constant effort to innovate," he says. "Instead of a clean canvas, you are blessed with a pentimento, a piece of art that is constantly repainted but contains the ghosts and echoes of all the brushstrokes piled on the canvas below."

Since joining Time Inc., Isaacson has somehow completed three books, most recently the 1992 biography Kissinger, which was a nationwide best seller. His time-management approach to life would be the envy even of the subject of his next opus, Benjamin Franklin, and it is a testimony to Isaacson's range that he can go from a 20th century statesman to an 18th century one without skipping a beat.

I can think of no better words to impart to TIME's newest managing editor than the ones that Gaines gave to the staff at a party a few weeks ago to celebrate the changing of the guard. He said, "I envy Walter this day, and I envy you the chance to work with Walter, who is exceedingly well prepared for this job and will do brilliantly. This, frankly, is a horrible thought, the horror of all transitions--a little glimpse of mortality. But it is the way of things. Walter's magazine will be better than mine was, and I will be rooting for it to be, if perhaps in that bittersweet way that fathers root for their sons to better them."