Helen Valentine

Born Helen Rose Lachman in Manhattan,[2] she was the only child of German Jewish immigrants.[3][4] Her father Gustave was an accountant and her mother Bertha (née Kahn) was a homemaker.[3] Although she attended temple with her mother and went to Jewish Sunday school, her family also celebrated Christmas.[3] She graduated from the Ethical Culture School and Barnard College.[2]

After school, she worked in the magazine industry.[5] In 1944, while serving as promotion director for Mademoiselle magazine at Walter Annenberg's Triangle Publications, she was asked by Annenberg to help revive a movie magazine.[2] Although the concept of "teenager" as a distinct demographic segment of the population was a relatively new idea at that time,[5] Valentine instead proposed a magazine for teen-age girls.[2] Noticing the wide popularity of a King Features Syndicate comic strip by cartoonist Hilda Terry that focused on the trials and tribulations of a typical teenager's life entitled Teena which began running in July 1944,[5] Valentine convinced Annenberg that teenage girls needed a magazine of their own and that the then unserved demographic had the potential to become an important and lucrative new consumer market segment[5] stating that "It was time to treat children as adults."[2]

The magazine was launched in September 1944[5] and within a year, Seventeen had a circulation of a million.[2] Seventeen is credited with creating a teen market for clothing manufacturers and other industries.[2] In 1950, she accepted a job with Street & Smith to revamp a fading fashion magazine called Charm which she re-configured into the country's first magazine for working women.[2] Charm was eventually merged into Glamour magazine after being bought by Conde Nast Publications.[2] In 1958, Valentine was hired by Good Housekeeping magazine to write a column, Young Wife's World, where she remained until she retired in 1963.[2]

Valentine was married to banker Herbert Valentine (died 1978).[2][6] She had two children: Barbara Valentine Hertz and Barry Valentine.[2][7] Her granddaughter, Valentine Hertz Kass[3] was one of the first women Producer/Directors at KQED in San Francisco, the first Director of the Navy Pier IMAX Theater, and the Founding Director of the American Children’s Television Festival.[8][9] Her great-grandson, Sam Kass, served as Barack Obama's Senior Policy Advisor For Nutrition Policy.[10] Valentine died in 1986 in Miami at her daughter's home.[1]