First publication The first
Stag, published by Leeds Publishing Corp., beginning with vol. 1, #1 (June 1937), was a 25-cent, 96-page, digest subtitled "A Magazine for Men" and which included articles and stories by such writers as
Carleton Beals,
Elsa Maxwell,
Bernard Sobel, and
Hendrik Willem van Loon. It covered a range of topics, including literature, music, sports, and theater, along with stories on male-female relationships, sexual issues, and such topics as
striptease.
Second publication A second
Stag, published by Official Com. Inc. and edited by Noah Sarlat, appeared circa 1951 as a 25-cent, 82-page, standard-sized
men's adventure magazine. This version, containing ostensibly "true-life" fiction of men in wartime or in rugged adventure mode, continued through at least volume 22 in 1971. In 1958,
Martin Goodman took over the magazine, using first his Atlas Magazines imprint, and then switching to his
Magazine Management imprint circa 1970 with the cover price rising to 50 cents. In 1953, the publisher at the time threatened fledgling magazine founder
Hugh Hefner with a
trademark infringement lawsuit unless he changed the name of his planned men's magazine,
Stag Party; Hefner redubbed the magazine
Playboy. Goodman also published the
annual publication Stag Annual, starting in 1964.
Bruce Minney, and
Mort Kunstler.
Transition to pornography Stag transitioned to become a men's
pornographic magazine, published by Goodman's son Charles "Chip" Goodman at Magazine Management's successor company, Swank Publications. The
Magna Publishing Group bought
Stag and its sister publication
Swank from that company in 1993. ==References==