Clay Felker was the man who made magazines matter again.
After Harold Hayes (with some help from Felker) made Esquire the king of hip in the '60's, Felker duplicated that achievement in the '70's—and simultaneously invented the modern city magazine.
He loved the right writers, and the right writers loved him: Gay Talese, Tom Wolfe, Gloria Steinem, Aaron Latham, Nick Pileggi, Dick Reeves, Dick Schaap, Andy Tobias, Mimi Sheraton, John Simon, Judith Crist, and many more. Before anyone had heard of Woodward or Bernstein, these were the bylines which convinced kids like me that writing just might be the best profession you could aspire to.