The History of National Geographic

Podcast Transcript

On January 13, 1888, a group of thirty-three prominent citizens gathered at the Cosmos Club in Washington, DC, to establish “a society for the increase and diffusion of geographical knowledge.”

At first, the organization was more of a scholarly endeavor, but over time, it became one of the most popular brands dedicated to science, exploration, and discovery.

Through its publications, it has allowed millions of people a glimpse of what life is like elsewhere in the world.

Learn more about National Geographic and its humble beginnings on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.

This is an episode I have been thinking about for quite some time, and I figured it was finally time to do it.

The reason why I’ve been considering doing this episode for so long is that National Geographic has had a big influence on my life and, indirectly, on the creation of this very podcast.

Most of you probably have an image in your mind when you think of National Geographic. Maybe you can envision the magazine with the gold rectangular border, or the TV channels, or the books they publish.

However, before any of that, there was the National Geographic Society.

Founded on January 13, 1888, in Washington, D.C., the organization emerged during an era of intense geographic exploration and scientific discovery. Thirty-three prominent citizens, including geographers, explorers, teachers, lawyers, cartographers, military officers, and financiers, gathered at the Cosmos Club to establish “a society for the increase and diffusion of geographical knowledge.”

Among the founding members was Gardiner Greene Hubbard, a lawyer, financier, and philanthropist who became the Society’s first president. Hubbard was already well-known as the father-in-law of Alexander Graham Bell and had been instrumental in supporting Bell’s telephone inventions.

The other founders represented the intellectual elite of late nineteenth-century America, including scientists and academics who recognized that geography encompassed far more than mapmaking. It was a lens through which you could understand the entire natural and human world.

The Society’s creation reflected the spirit of its age. The late 1880s marked a period when the American public was fascinated by exploration and discovery. The Western frontier was closing, and attention turned to understanding distant lands and peoples.

Scientific societies were proliferating, and there was growing recognition that systematic study of the Earth’s geography could yield practical benefits for commerce, military strategy, and general knowledge.

The founders envisioned an organization that would not only sponsor expeditions and research but also disseminate geographic knowledge to a broader audience.

Nine months after the Society’s founding, in October 1888, the first issue of National Geographic Magazine appeared. Initially, the magazine was a modest academic journal printed on brown paper with a terra cotta cover.

It featured dense scientific articles, statistical tables, and technical reports intended primarily for the Society’s membership, which numbered only about 200 in those early days.

The magazine bore little resemblance to the colorful publication it would become. Its content was dry and scholarly, focusing on technical geography, geological surveys, and meteorological data. There were no photographs, no color illustrations, and certainly nothing that would appeal to a general readership.

The early years proved challenging. The magazine struggled to find an audience beyond the Society’s small membership. Circulation remained stagnant, and the publication’s academic tone failed to generate broader interest. The Society itself operated on a modest budget, relying on membership dues and occasional donations.

For more than a decade, National Geographic remained an obscure scientific journal, known only to specialists and having little impact on public consciousness.

The transformation of both the Society and its magazine began in 1899 when Alexander Graham Bell, who had been elected the Society’s second president in 1898, made a pivotal decision.

Bell invited Gilbert Hovey Grosvenor, a young teacher and his future son-in-law, to come to Washington and work as an assistant editor of the magazine.

This appointment would prove to be one of the most consequential in the history of American publishing. Grosvenor was just twenty-three years old, recently graduated from Amherst College, and had little journalism experience. What he possessed, however, was vision, determination, and a willingness to experiment.

Grosvenor formally became editor in 1903 and would guide the magazine for the next fifty-five years, transforming it from an obscure academic journal into one of the world’s most influential publications. His editorial philosophy represented a radical departure from the magazine’s scholarly origins.

Grosvenor believed that geographic knowledge should be accessible to everyone, not just academics and specialists. He understood that education could be entertaining, and that facts could be conveyed through compelling narratives and stunning imagery.

His approach was summarized in what became known as Grosvenor’s principles: abundant use of photographs, avoidance of partisanship and controversy, focus on the positive rather than negative aspects of places and peoples, and commitment to accuracy and fairness.

The first major innovation came in 1905 when Grosvenor made the bold decision to publish eleven pages of photographs from the Philippines. This was unprecedented for a magazine of its type.

The photographs were not merely illustrations but constituted the primary content, telling stories through images rather than relying solely on text. Reader response was enthusiastic, and membership in the Society began to grow.

Grosvenor recognized that he had discovered something powerful: photographs could transport readers to distant places in ways that words alone could not.

Building on this success, Grosvenor continued to expand the magazine’s photographic content. In 1910, National Geographic published its first photograph of a wild animal taken at night using flash photography. The following year brought more innovations, including the publication of photographs in larger formats that allowed readers to see greater detail.

The magazine was developing a distinctive visual style that would become its hallmark. Photographs were chosen not just for their documentary value but for their aesthetic appeal and their ability to convey a sense of place and culture.

A watershed moment came in 1916 when National Geographic became the first publication to include natural-color photographs throughout an entire issue.

Color photography was still in its infancy, requiring complex technical processes and considerable expense. Many publishers considered it impractical for widespread use. But Grosvenor saw color as essential to the magazine’s mission.

Black and white photographs, while powerful, could not fully capture the beauty of a tropical bird’s plumage, the varying hues of a sunset over the Grand Canyon, or the vibrant textiles of traditional costumes.

The July 1916 issue featured color photographs from the gardens and parks of the Far East, and readers were captivated. The technology was crude by modern standards, the colors were sometimes oversaturated or imperfect, but the impact was undeniable.

During these early years, the Society expanded its support for exploration and scientific research. The Society supported Robert Peary’s expeditions to the Arctic. The organization funded Hiram Bingham’s expeditions to Peru, which led to the introduction of Machu Picchu to the rest of the world in 1911.

The magazine documented these expeditions extensively, allowing readers to follow them vicariously. Articles about polar exploration, mountain climbing, archaeological discoveries, and encounters with remote cultures became staples of the publication.

Explorers and scientists who received National Geographic funding often wrote their own accounts, providing firsthand narratives that combined scientific observation with personal adventure.

The 1920s and 1930s saw continued growth and influence. The Society’s membership swelled from tens of thousands to millions. National Geographic Magazine became a fixture in American homes, schools, and libraries.

Its distinctive yellow-bordered cover, which had been standardized by the mid-twentieth century, became one of the most recognizable symbols in publishing.

During World War II, the magazine took on new significance. While maintaining its policy of avoiding partisanship, National Geographic served the war effort by providing maps and geographic intelligence.

The Society produced special map supplements for service members and civilians, helping Americans understand the global scope of the conflict. Articles explained the geography, resources, and peoples of war zones and allied nations.

In 1957, Gilbert Grosvenor retired after fifty-five years as editor, succeeded by his son Melville Bell Grosvenor, continuing the family’s connection to the magazine.

Melville pushed the magazine in new directions, embracing emerging technologies and expanding its visual storytelling. Under his leadership, the magazine increased its page count, improved its color reproduction, and adopted more innovative layouts that gave photographs even greater prominence.

The Society continued to sponsor groundbreaking research. Notable among these efforts was the support for Jane Goodall’s chimpanzee research in Tanzania, Dian Fossey’s mountain gorilla research in Rwanda, and Biruté Galdikas’s orangutan studies in Borneo.

Louis and Mary Leakey’s paleoanthropological research in East Africa received substantial support from the Society, and their discoveries about human evolution were featured prominently in the magazine. Richard Leakey continued this tradition, and National Geographic became the primary venue for communicating major discoveries about human origins to the general public.

Underwater exploration represented another major focus. The Society supported Jacques Cousteau’s pioneering work in marine biology and underwater photography. Cousteau’s articles and the magazine’s coverage of his expeditions helped create public awareness of ocean environments and the need for marine conservation.

Robert Ballard’s discovery of the Titanic in 1985, sponsored in part by National Geographic, captivated worldwide attention and demonstrated the Society’s continued commitment to exploration.

As the twentieth century drew to a close, National Geographic faced new challenges from changing media consumption patterns. Magazine circulation, while still in the millions, began to decline as readers increasingly turned to digital sources for information and entertainment.

The rise of cable television, particularly channels focused on nature and science programming, created competition for audiences. The internet threatened the relevance of a monthly print publication.

In response, National Geographic launched a television channel in partnership with Fox. The magazine developed an online presence, offering digital content that complemented rather than simply replicated the print publication.

In 2015, the National Geographic Society underwent a significant reorganization. The Society entered into a partnership with 21st Century Fox, which resulted in most of the Society’s media properties, including the magazine, being transferred to a new for-profit venture called National Geographic Partners.

The Society retained a 27 percent stake and continued to focus on scientific research, conservation, and education, funded in part by revenue from the partnership.

Following Disney’s acquisition of much of 21st Century Fox in 2019, Disney took Fox’s majority position in National Geographic Partners.

Today, it is helpful to think of “National Geographic” as two tightly linked entities with different legal purposes. The National Geographic Society remains a nonprofit scientific and educational organization that funds exploration, research, education, and conservation initiatives worldwide.

At the same time, National Geographic Partners operates much of the commercial storytelling ecosystem, including major media distribution.

At the start of the episode, I said that National Geographic had a major influence on me.

I began reading at a very young age, before I was in kindergarten. My father also had a subscription to National Geographic, which I would devour every month.

My friend Greg’s parents got him a subscription to National Geographic World, which was the magazine for kids. I’d read it whenever I could when I was over at his house.

My uncle Paul worked for the school district and would often bring home old copies of National Geographic that they were getting rid of. Many of those were from the 1960s, and I’d obsess over all the articles about space flights.

When I was older, in the early 2000s, I began collecting National Geographic magazines. There aren’t a whole lot of collectors, but there are a lot of people who just amass them in their basements or garages.

I would put an ad on Craigslist and had people give me their back issues for free if I would just come and pick them up. Their father or grandfather may have had a bunch, and they didn’t want to throw them away, but they did want to see them go to a good home.

I have almost every issue from 2000 to 1912, with all the missing issues being from before 1950. I also have a very rare original copy of the very first issue, which was published in 1888.

One of my other significant items is a copy of the 1930 Machu Picchu book release with the original slip cover. Only 500 of these were ever printed, and they almost never have the original slipcover.

When I began traveling in 2007, looking back, I have to attribute the idea to having been a reader of National Geographic for years. The same can be said for taking up travel photography. It was my opportunity to go out and do the things that I had been reading about for years.

When the time came to launch this podcast, it was just a natural extension of everything I’d had been doing before.

…and for the record, I’ve never worked for or have done photography for National Geographic, but I do know several people who have written and photographed for them over the years, and I have gotten a personal tour of their headquarters in Washington.

The National Geographic Society and its magazine have profoundly shaped how millions of people understand the world. They have supported science and exploration for over a century and, in the process, became a billion-dollar brand.

…and it all started because a group of prominent citizens wanted improve the state of geography education over 135 years ago.