Helen Gurley Brown, is an author, publisher, and businesswoman. She was editor-in-chief of Cosmopolitan magazine for 32 years.Brown's father died in an elevator accident when she was young, and her sister was a polio victim. She was raised in Little Rock, Arkansas.From 1939 to 1941 she attended Texas State College for Women and Woodbury Business College.After a stint in the mailroom at the William Morris Agency, she went to work for a prominent advertising agency as a secretary. Her employer recognized her writing skills and moved her to the copywriting department where she advanced rapidly to become one of the nation's highest paid ad copywriters in the early 1960s. In 1959 she married David Brown who was producer of Jaws, The Sting, Cocoon, Driving Miss Daisy, and other motion pictures.In 1962, at the age of 40, Brown authored the bestselling book Sex and the Single Girl. In 1965 she became editor-in-chief of Cosmopolitan and reversed the fortunes of the failing magazine. During the decade of the 1960s she was an outspoken advocate of women's sexual freedom and sought to provide them with role-models and a guide in her magazine. Brown claimed that women could have it all, "love, sex, and money". Due to her advocacy, the liberated single woman was often referred to generically as the "Cosmo Girl". Her work played a part in what is often called the sexual revolution.In the mid 1990s Brown was ousted from her role as the US editor of Cosmopolitan and was replaced by Bonnie Fuller. However, Brown stayed on at Hearst publishing and remains the international editor for all 59 international editions of Cosmo.
Born at 3:0am-CST
As editor-in-chief of Cosmopolitan from 1965-1996, Brown published readers confessions on the most unusual places they were intimate, an article entitled "How Id steal the president (Richard Nixon ) away from Pat," and the Burt Reynolds centerfold. Betty Friedan called Cosmopolitan under Browns sex-drenched stewardship "quite obscene and quite horrible."
Until her death, Girley Brown was known for coming into her pink corner office nearly every day.
Born to Ira and Cleo Gurley, both school teachers.
The family moved to Little Rock when Ira was elected to the state legislature.
Her father died in an elevator accident when Helen was 10 years old.
Cleo Gurley moved the family to Los Angeles in the late 1930s.
Gurley Brown excelled socially and academically, graduating from high school as class valedictorian.
Gurley Brown went on to earn a business degree at Woodbury Business College, and began her career in 1941 with a series of secretarial jobs.
She was said to bring her lunch to work almost every day for the more than 30 years she spent at Hearst.
Mentor to Bonnie Fuller.
Friend of Hugh Hefner , Erica Jong.
Nearly every glamorous, wealthy, successful career woman you might envy,now started out as some kind of schlep.
Good girls go to Heaven -- bad girls go everywhere.
Never fail to know that if you are doing all the talking, you are boring,somebody.
I never liked the looks of the life that was programmed for me -,ordinary, hillbilly and poor - and I repudiated it from the time I was,seven years old.
[describing herself] A mouseburger is a young woman who is not very,prepossessing. She is not beautiful. She is poor, has no family,connections, and she is not a razzle-dazzle ball of charm. She is a,kind of waif.
My success was not based so much on any great intelligence but on great common sense.
Nearly every glamorous wealthy successful career woman you might envy now started out as some kind of schlepp.
Never fail to know that if you are doing all the talking you are boring somebody.
My success was not based so much on any great intelligence but on great common sense. .
