My husband asked me a question the other night and my answer was a revelation to me. In my memoir, I talk about my first apartment (the one across the street from Davy Jones!) and share my coming-of-age story. I didn’t share the after-story which is very telling about my role as Feature Editor and “acting” Editor.
Once I was hired as an Editorial Assistant, my job almost immediately became so much more. In the early months of 1966, I was given assignments, which I covered whether it was to interview Sonny and Cher or Dino, Desi & Billy. Even before I began working full time when I finished my second year of college in May of 1966, I was being given so much more responsibility. After I completed a dozen or so assignments, when I would pitch a story to Editorial Director, Ralph Benner, he would always give me the go-ahead. He had been creating story ideas by sitting in his office and I was out and about every day in Hollywood, so story ideas were easy.
By the summer, I was no longer being given assignments. They had literally turned the magazine over to me and I was managing my own stories, assignments for freelancers, and I had begun working closely with our Art Director, Norbert Jobst. Norbert was a tall, thin gay man, who was a creative artist and just a fun person to be around. He had a great sense of humor and we hit it off from day one.
That summer I went on tour with Paul Revere and the Raiders and Dino, Desi and Billy and when I came back, I began approving page layouts as they were designed and before they went off to our printer in Chicago. I know if this “promotion” wasn’t even spoken about. One day it just was. At the time, it was just a natural progression. No one made an announcement that now Ann Moses would be choosing photos for the layouts from the photographer’s contact sheets or discussing the look of the pages with Norbert. It just morphed day by week by months into the role of Editor, even though it wouldn’t be until February 3, 1968 that I was officially made Editor.
As these “adjustments” or “promotions” to my job happened, without fanfare, and it became an organic progression of responsibility. When I look back, the thing I still find remarkable is that there was never any competition or jealousy from anyone on the staff. I took over Laudy Powell’s job as her marriage/baby situation changed and before long, she was working on other Laufer Publishing projects, where she was writing special “books” for sale or writing a beauty column for Tiger Beat. When I look at today’s world of almost any profession, it can be cutthroat, but not here. And as the magazine continued to sell more copies every month, even when we raised the price, added pages and began printing slick color pin-ups, everyone in the company enjoyed the feelings of success. It did not translate into more money in my paycheck.
Shortly after New Year’s Eve (the underwhelming night), I got very sick. I hadn’t missed more than five days of school from grade school to high school. I was very healthy. But I was knocked out by a virus – something like the flu, but I was too ill to go into work or do anything else. I just lay in bed in my apartment for two weeks. I had found an OBGYN for my birth control needs back in November, but had only seen our primary care physician in Anaheim once in a great while for anything else.
One of the days when I was in misery at home, I got a call from Norbert. The final page layouts for the February issue needed approval, and he asked if he could come over to get my approval. I just remember that part so clearly. I was dressed in a bathrobe and he laid out the pages on the round dining room table in my furnished rental and we went through them. This was January of 1967, so I had been with Tiger Beat for one full year and I hadn’t even reached my 20th birthday.
I believe it was after Norbert’s visit, that I went home to Anaheim, saw my doctor and whatever he prescribed, I was back to my normal, healthy self within a week or two. I can’t remember ever missing another day at Tiger Beat after that. By March of 1967, it was my name on the Meow! column as well as “I Visit with The Monkees” monthly column. Thinking back, it was a unique moment in time, women were not paid what men were paid for the same job, but Laufer Publishing was unique in its hiring and promoting of women. For that I am grateful. The dichotomy was that the women of Tiger Beat were the ones making the bottom line go up and up. And only the men reaped those financial rewards.
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