The year-long celebration of Ohio State’s 150th anniversary called for a keepsake, and sponsors of the sesquicentennial observance turned to the alumni magazine team to create it in the form of a signature publication. Ohio State Alumni Magazine’s 112-page Sesquicentennial Issue hit mailboxes in the weeks leading up to the anniversary year kickoff. About a quarter larger than our usual magazine and distributed to our most engaged alumni—more than 100,000 life and sustaining members of the alumni association—the special edition included a 60-page feature well covering five themes of utmost importance to the university, and 52 pages devoted to the alumni magazine’s recurring departments. The feature well served as the foundation for a second magazine distributed to all other alumni plus faculty, staff, students, and many donors, extending the life of this special content and providing a gift for visitors to sesquicentennial events throughout the year.
From the Judges
This is entry was excellent, comprehensive, creative, compelling, flawless and fun. It was clearly an enormous undertaking, and it worked well, with strong visuals, excellent photography, and compelling content from cover to cover. The infographics were really well done and easy to read. One judge enjoyed how the tone was consistently, unabashedly proud and sentimental about the institution and its goals. Another judge said she felt she was reading a magazine that was a combination of National Geographic (photos) and Time magazine (layout and stories). Some features that were called out for excellence were “Behind the Cover,” “Where’s Brutus?,” “Bumper Crop,” and the story on Olivia J. Hooker.
