Ramparts
Series
Identifier:
2016.040.21-->
Description
Ramparts was a glossy illustrated American political and literary magazine, published from 1962 to 1975 and closely associated with the New Left political movement. Unlike most of the radical magazines of the day, Ramparts was expensively produced and graphically sophisticated.Ramparts was an early opponent of the Vietnam War. Its April 1966 cover article concerned the Michigan State University Group, a technical assistance program in South Vietnam that Ramparts claimed was a front for CIA covert operations. In August 1966, managing editor James F. Colaianni wrote the first national article denouncing the US use of napalm in that conflict. One of the magazine's most controversial covers depicted the hands of four of its editors holding burning draft cards, with their names clearly visible. Ramparts also covered conspiracy theories about the Kennedy assassination. The magazine published Che Guevara's diaries, with an introduction by Fidel Castro, and the prison diaries of Eldridge Cleaver, later republished as Soul On Ice. Upon his release from prison, Cleaver became a Ramparts staff writer.
The magazine's size and influence grew dramatically over these years. Moving to monthly production, combined subscriptions and newsstand sales increased from just under 100,000 at the end of 1966 to nearly 250,000 in 1968, a figure more than double that of the liberal weekly, The Nation.
Beginning in 1966 American authorities began investigating the magazine's funding, suspecting Soviet financial connections. CIA Director William Raborn asked for a report, and files were gathered on many of the editors and writers. According to a book published in 2008, it was the first time the CIA had targeted a US publication, a violation of the National Security Act of 1947.
(Taken from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramparts_(magazine))