Clarence O. Smith, a cofounder of Essence magazine, is dead at 92

Boston Globe

08-05-2025

'We had to overcome this perception,' he said in an interview. 'Clarence suggested that we start telling the story of Black women as strivers.'
Mr. Smith, who as the magazine's president was in charge of advertising and marketing, made the initial pitch to reluctant companies that there were 12 million Black women in the United States who controlled a market worth more than $30 billion, and that the magazine would target 4.2 million of the more affluent among them -- women between the ages of 18 and 45 who were urban, educated, and had increasing discretionary income.
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A confident and charming extemporaneous speaker, Mr. Smith had come well prepared with market research, colleagues said, but his challenge was evident from the outset: The first issue of the magazine carried only 13 pages of advertising, and the second and third issues fared even worse, with just five pages of ads apiece.
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But while the magazine, with offices in Manhattan, continued to face obstacles, its prospects improved: Circulation went from an inaugural run of 50,000 copies sold to eventually topping 1.1 million. The number of advertising pages grew to more than 1,000 yearly, attracting Estée Lauder, Johnson & Johnson, and Pillsbury among other companies. And the rate for a full-page color ad went from $2,500 to $48,000 by 2001, according to Mr. Smith.
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'Clarence was a relentless champion for the leadership of Black women and the impact of our spending power that was ignored,' Susan L. Taylor, the magazine's editor-in-chief from 1981 until 2000, said in an interview.
The seed for Essence began to germinate in November 1968, when a small group of Black professionals -- Lewis, Cecil Hollingsworth, and Jonathan Blount, all strangers to one another -- met at a Wall Street conference held to encourage African American entrepreneurship. Mr. Smith joined the group two weeks later.
It was a time of social and civil unrest in the United States, with urban riots, the assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy, and the Vietnam War in its deadliest year. But it was also a period -- at the intersection of the Civil Rights Movement and the Black women's empowerment movement -- of increasing opportunities for the creation of Black-owned businesses.
The concept of a magazine for Black women was championed by Blount, according to Taylor. 'His mother would say, 'Why do I have to read magazines where I see no one who looks like me?'' she recalled.
Mr. Smith, who had been a top salesperson for Prudential insurance, had been the most successful of the four original partners and the oldest, Lewis wrote in his memoir, 'The Man From Essence: Creating a Magazine for Black Women' (2014). He was also the only one with a car. Astutely, he persuaded Ford, General Motors, and Toyota to buy ads, something they had seldom done in women's publications.
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The first cover of Essence featured model Barbara Cheeseborough, who wore an Afro and a look that suggested authenticity as an equal to glamour.
Inside there were photographic essays on fashion and beauty, celebrating models of diverse skin tones. One article, headlined 'Sensual Black Man, Do You Love Me?,' explored the topic of Black men dating and marrying white women. Another article focused on women who were active in the Civil Rights Movement, from Rosa Parks to Kathleen Cleaver of the Black Panther Party.
Given a preview of the inaugural issue, Philip H. Dougherty, The New York Times' advertising correspondent, called it a 'handsome piece of work.'
Clarence O. Smith was born March 31, 1933, in New York City to Clarence Smith and Millicent Frey (sometimes spelled Fry). He grew up in the Williamsbridge section of the Bronx.
In a 2005 interview with NPR, Mr. Smith described the neighborhood of his youth, mostly Black but with integrated schools, as a collegial place where parents taught their children values of both self-improvement and selflessness.
'We had a responsibility to grow up to be people who made a productive life and who looked after the larger community as well,' he said.
At Essence, to please advertisers, he pushed for more ads to be placed in the front pages and encouraged the magazine to produce special issues devoted to beauty or travel as ways to reach advertisers in those particular industries. He also hired an advertising sales staff made up predominantly of Black women, noted Marcia Ann Gillespie, editor-in-chief of Essence from 1971 to 1980.
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'The resistance of white businesses to associate with a Black women's magazine was really intense,' Gillespie said, and Mr. Smith, she added, 'was always trying to find a way through and around and was relentless about it. Failure was not on his to-do list.'
Mr. Smith played crucial roles in expanding the entertainment side of Essence with an annual awards show that honored Black women, and with a culture and music festival that continues to draw roughly 500,000 attendees to New Orleans each July.
'He was a futurist,' said Barbara Britton, a former vice president of advertising at Essence.
Of the original four founders, Mr. Smith and Lewis were the only ones who remained with the company long afterward. But their 32-year partnership began to deteriorate in the 1990s over a tangle of issues, personal and professional.
Their final disagreement, in 2000, was over the sale of 49 percent of Essence to Time Warner. Mr. Smith opposed it. Lewis wrote in his memoir that it was his belief that Mr. Smith 'didn't want to see a viable Black-owned company sell out to whites.'
By 2002, Lewis owned more stock than Mr. Smith and had gained the upper hand in the company. Mr. Smith was forced out and received a buyout of $14 million after seeking $40 million, Lewis wrote. The two seldom spoke afterward.
After leaving Essence, Mr. Smith started a record label and a travel business.
Essence sold the remaining 51 percent of its ownership to Time Warner in 2005. (In 2018, the magazine was sold to Richelieu Dennis, the founder of a large personal-care products company, and became fully Black-owned again. Today it publishes six issues a year and has a robust online presence.)
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Along with Boyd, his niece, Mr. Smith leaves his wife, Elaine (Goss) Smith, and a granddaughter, Denise Diaz. The Smiths' two sons, Clarence Jr. and Craig, died before him.
Lewis said Mr. Smith should be celebrated for helping to validate the value of Black female consumers and to shape the way Black women were perceived.
'He came across as authentic, really believing what he was selling, backed up by research,' Lewis said, recalling the magazine's early days. 'We were always prepared, because we knew that we were selling a market that no one wanted to be a part of.'
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