CAST OF CHARACTERS: Wolcott Gibbs, E.B. White, James Thurber, and the Golden Age of The New Yorker

From its birth in 1925 to the early days of the Cold War, The New Yorker took hold as the country's most prestigious, entertaining, and informative general-interest periodical. Vinciguerra paints a group portrait of the magazine's cadre of charming, wise-cracking, driven, troubled, brilliant writers and editors. Photos.