Fawcett Publications

Fawcett Publications was an American publishing company launched in 1919 in Robbinsdale, Minnesota by Wilford H. "Captain Billy" Fawcett (1883-1940). A World War I Army captain, Fawcett had been a police reporter for the Minneapolis Journal before the war.

The Fawcett family

Captain Billy and Claire Fawcett had four sons -- Roger, Wilford, Gordon Wesley and the youngest, Roscoe. As a boy, Roscoe Kent Fawcett (February 7, 1913-December 23, 1999) attended Minneapolis schools and was assigned tasks such as dusting furniture and beach cleaning at his father's Breezy Point Resort before he became a vice president and circulation manager for the family publishing company. After Captain Billy's death, his sons, including Roscoe Fawcett, managed the Breezy Point Resort for a short time before they sold it. However, Roscoe Fawcett also maintained his own private hunting retreat, the Tsawhawbitts Lodge (pronounced Cha-ha-bich), in Jarbidge, Nevada. This two acre (8,000 m²) riverfront bed and breakfast estate, now valued at $1 million, has 7,500 square feet (700 m²) of living area in three buildings -- the seven-bedroom log house, the guest house with garage and shop, and the party house with full kitchen, bar and barbeque patio.

Related Topics:
February 7 - 1913 - December 23 - 1999

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Roscoe Fawcett was a veteran of World War II, serving in the anti-aircraft division of the U.S. Army, and later was in charge of entertainment for Camp Hahn in Riverside, California. He was married twice, had four sons and died at the age of 86 in Brainerd, Minnesota. One of his sons, Roscoe Fawcett Jr., became the publisher of American Fitness magazine.

Related Topics:
World War II - Riverside, California - Brainerd, Minnesota

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Born in Minneapolis in 1912, Gordon Fawcett graduated from the University of Minnesota in 1934. He married Vivian Peterson in 1935 and moved to Los Angeles where he was Fawcett Publications' office manager. He held the title of secretary-treasurer when the company moved to Greenwich, Connecticut in 1940, and he was 81 when he died in West Palm Beach, Florida, on January 16, 1993.

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Fawcett Publications had offices at 67 West 44th Street in Manhattan where vice-president Roger Fawcett liked to show visitors around the publishers' penthouse and serve them drinks dispensed through the gold penis of a nude male statue.

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