Sexy Cowboy Roger Hodge to Edit Harper's
Harper's has announced that 38-year-old Roger Hodge will be the heir to outgoing editor Lewis Lapham's throne. In 1996, Hodge joined the magazine as an intern (yes, a 29-year-old intern, but Harper's is "special" like that and wherever Hodge was during those first 29 years MATTERS NOT!); since then, has moved up the ranks to serve as deputy editor. Lapham is pleased with the decision, publisher John MacArthur is pleased, and we're sure Hodge's wife and two children are also pleased.
And, since you're obviously wondering, we too are also very pleased, if only for slightly different reasons: Roger Hodge is undeniably hot. Like, Kyle McLachlan but way better. The hotness runs deeper than you think, too:
Mr. Hodge was born and raised in Del Rio, Tex., and as the son of a rancher knows his way around cattle, sheep and a gun. The family spread is now a hunting ground, and Mr. Hodge's gimlet eye extends beyond raw copy to the scope of a rifle.
Dear, sweet God. Can't you just imagine Hodge working hard on the ranch? The intense Texas heat forcing him to go shirtless, his muscles glistening in the sun as he surveys the land, trusty rifle in hand...
Oh! Sorry. Didn't realize you were still here. After the jump, the full release from Harper's.
****************************
ROGER D. HODGE TO BECOME THIRTEENTH
EDITOR OF HARPER S MAGAZINE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
November 29, 2005 John R. MacArthur, president and publisher of Harper s Magazine, today announced that Roger D. Hodge would become Editor of the 155-year-old monthly when Lewis H. Lapham assumes the title of Editor Emeritus in the spring of next year. Roger Hodge joined the magazine as an intern in June 1996; after his internship he was hired as a fact checker. Hodge has made significant contributions to the magazine throughout his tenure: he joined the magazine s acclaimed Readings section in 1997 and edited the section from 1999 to 2003; in December 2000 he orchestrated the relaunch of the magazine s website, Harpers.org, and created the popular Weekly Review. In the fall of 2003 Hodge left the Readings section, and in December of 2003 he oversaw a radical redesign of Harpers.org; that month he also began writing a monthly print column, Findings, a compendium of medical, scientific, and environmental absurdities drawn from recent news reports and scientific journals. Hodge was named Deputy Editor of the magazine in November of 2004.
Hodge, 38, was born and raised in Del Rio, Texas, where his family has been in the ranching business for five generations. He attended the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee and eventually made his way to New York City in pursuit of a Ph.D. in philosophy at The New School for Social Research. Hodge received a master s degree but abandoned his dissertation to work at Harper s Magazine. He lives in Brooklyn, New York, with his wife and their two sons.
Hodge will be inheriting a magazine that is the strongest it has been since it was redesigned in 1984. Newsstand sales are at their highest level (43,287 average for the first nine months of 2005), and the renewal rate is 72.3%, an historic high.
Harper s Magazine, founded in 1850, is the oldest continually published general interest magazine in the United States.
