Archiving M.E.M.O.
One of my tasks as the Century’s online-editorial intern is to archive past issues on the website. It can be tedious, but it’s also quite fascinating to see various subjects develop in the magazine’s pages over time. At this point I’ve worked back as far as Christmas 1998, meaning the Bill Clinton-Monica Lewinsky scandal is front and center. I was 11 when that happened; I know the present-day Clinton everyone loves much better than the 1998 Clinton no one knew what to do with.
But by far the highlight is reading Martin Marty’s old columns. Whenever I get to a new issue I skip to the back page, knowing I’ll get a nice chuckle. Below are some of my recently archived favorites. Call it an attempt to persuade you to subscribe to the Century—giving you access to the online archives—or call it a nice diversion after a couple tough weeks in the world.
In this column, on a controversy over journalist James Warren accepting an upgrade to fly first class, Marty “searched [his] own soul”:
