August 1, 2005

ON PARADE MAGAZINE’S 20 YEARS OF SUPPORT OF MDA

For 64 years, Parade magazine has been a mainstay of American publishing and a welcome presence in American homes. Parade delivers lively but authoritative cover stories, articles and columns on a multitude of subjects ranging from health to popular entertainment to stories of personal courage and achievement. Parade, which has featured the work of notable writers ranging from Norman Mailer to Carl Sagan, is included in 340 of the nation’s finest newspapers and has over 75 million readers.

	In 1984, Parade featured this classic image taken by renowned photographer Eddie Adams.

Walter Anderson, chairman and CEO of Parade Publications, feels that Parade’s status as the country’s most widely read magazine is due in large part to its focus on the individual’s potential to transform himself and positively affect the world.

Parade’s positive emphasis and its frequent focus on issues of interest to families made it a natural partner with MDA. The first inkling of this relationship manifested in 1984, when Parade featured a cover story on Jerry Lewis for its April 22 issue. The cover photo was the now famous Jerry Lewis half-clown face, an image that’s become inextricably linked with Jerry’s remarkable career.

	Walter Anderson, Chairman and CEO of Parade Publications, serves an an MDA National Vice President

That photo session was also significant in that it brought about the first meeting between Walter Anderson and Jerry Lewis, which developed into an enduring friendship. The following year, spurred in large part by that friendship, Parade began its tradition of featuring MDA-themed covers on its Labor Day weekend editions, coinciding with the Jerry Lewis MDA Labor Day Telethon. In this way, Parade has performed a monumental service for MDA, spreading awareness of MDA’s ongoing fight against more than 40 neuromuscular diseases.

“MDA is one of the finest run nonprofit organizations in all of the world,” Walter Anderson has said. Walter has appeared many times on the Telethon’s national broadcast, and recently came to MDA’s National Headquarters in Tucson, Ariz., to videotape segments for Telethon 2005.

	For 20 years, Parade has been featuring stories about MDA and the people MDA serves in its Labor Day Weekend editions.

Parade’s editor-in-chief, Lee Kravitz, is another dedicated journalist who’s taken MDA’s cause to heart. Lee bears the primary responsibility for crafting the MDA feature stories and selecting photographic subjects for the cover. He’s also taken time out of his schedule to visit MDA summer camp and make appearances on the Telethon’s national broadcast. MDA is very grateful for the committed support of this talented and compassionate media leader.

Many of the MDA-themed covers were shot by Eddie Adams, the same talented photojournalist who captured the Jerry Lewis half-clown face image. Adams’ photographs had appeared in other magazines besides Parade, including Time and Vanity Fair. His photos of political figures, celebrities and unfolding news events were known for their bold, arresting quality. The image he captured of a Viet Cong officer being executed in Saigon became a devastating icon of the Vietnam era and earned Adams the Pulitzer Prize.

	Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalist Eddie Adams took this cover photo in 1994 featuring baseball coach James Keller, who eventually would lose his life to ALS. Ironically, Adams received his own ALS diagnosis in 2004 and succumbed to the disease later that year.

One of the MDA-themed Parade covers shot by Adams appeared on the edition from Labor Day weekend of 1994. Featured on the cover was James Keller, a college baseball coach from Texas who was affected by amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and would eventually succumb to the disease.

In a terrible irony, Adams would himself receive a diagnosis of ALS in 2004. The disease progression was unusually rapid and Adams died in September of that year. In a segment on the 2004 Telethon shortly before Eddie’s death, his wife, Alyssa, spoke of the help and encouragement her family had received from MDA.

Adams had many friends, colleagues and students who were devastated by this loss, Walter Anderson prominent among them. On this year’s Telethon, Walter, who serves as an MDA National Vice President, will talk about his friendship with Eddie Adams and about Adams’ courage in fighting ALS.

	Child poet and MDA National Goodwill Ambassador Mattie Stepanek, who died in 2004, was featured on this Parade cover with MDA Board Member Jann Carl.

Walter says Parade’s task of coming up with a different MDA story each Labor Day is not overwhelmingly difficult. “Every year the news is different, the medical breakthroughs are different,” he says. “There are 40 neuromuscular diseases, and within those 40 there are extraordinary variations.”

“Every one of those photos has passion, tension,” Walter says of the Parade covers. “You’ve captured a moment. You’re seeing excitement in life. In a word, you’re seeing hope.”

On this 20th anniversary of the Parade/ MDA partnership, MDA is deeply grateful to Walter Anderson, Lee Kravitz and all the caring and creative people at Parade – people who make hope shine more brightly in the fight against neuromuscular diseases.

With every best wish . . .

The Ross Report Archive