Scholastic Coach, 75 years of leadership and service

Coach and Athletic Director, Oct, 2006 by Richard Robinson

In the summer of 1931, a 28-year-old camp counselor, baseball referee, and sportswriter for the New York World joined Scholastic to start its second magazine--Scholastic Coach. Jack K. Lippert, who possessed enough charismatic enthusiasm to inspire thousands of American coaches, thus started a 58-year career with Scholastic, primarily as Editor in Chief and Publisher of its magazines, supporting his lifelong colleagues and friends, M.R. "Robbie" Robinson, founder of Scholastic in 1920 and G. Herbert McCracken, an all-American athlete who became a great ad salesman and publisher of Coach and of Scholastic.

In Coach, Lippert, with photographer Owen Reed, pioneered the use of step by step action photography that showed how a baseball swing, a jump shot, a football play, or a discus throw sequentially unfolded, enabling coaches to break down the steps their players should follow.

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In the fall of 1936, Lippert handed over the editorship of Coach so he could start Junior Scholastic magazine for grades 6-8 social studies, an instant success and still Scholastic's best-known magazine.

Herman L. Masin, the editor who took over in 1936, is now 93 years old and still the editor today, 70 years later--the longest serving editor of the same magazine in the history of U.S. journalism. Masin, and later his colleague, Bruce Weber, publisher of Coach, became known to hundreds of thousands of coaches over the years, including some of America's best-known sports figures.

Scholastic Coach today remains a model of service to high school and college coaches and athletic directors, and one of the sharpest, best written sports magazines of all time. Lippert, McCracken, Masin, and Weber have helped millions of young athletes play better and learn the principles of sportsmanship. Together, over a period of 75 years, these four men--especially Masin--have enabled generations of players and coaches to pursue better athletic competition at higher levels of ethical and moral standards than would have been possible without Scholastic Coach.

--Richard Robinson

Chairman, President & CEO

Scholastic, Inc.