Cash, Lincoln Ross Colcord, Thomas Craven, Clarence Darrow, W. E. B. Du Bois, John Fante, William Faulkner, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Albert Halper, Langston Hughes, James Weldon Johnson, Zora Neale Hurston, Sinclair Lewis, Meridel LeSueur, Edgar Lee Masters, Victor Folke Nelson, Albert Jay Nock, Eugene O'Neill, Carl Sandburg, William Saroyan, and George Schuyler. Nathan provided theater criticism, and Mencken wrote the "Editorial Notes" and "The Library", the last being book reviews and social critique, placed at the back of each volume. The magazine published other writers, from newspapermen and academics to convicts and taxi drivers, but its primary emphasis soon became non-fiction and usually satirical essays. Its "Americana" section—containing items clipped from newspapers and other magazines nationwide—became a much-imitated feature. Mencken spiced the package with aphorisms printed in the magazine's margins whenever space allowed. Mencken's departure Mencken retired as editor of the magazine at the end of 1933. His chosen successor was economist and literary critic Henry Hazlitt. Differences with the publisher, Alfred A. Knopf Sr., however, led Hazlitt to resign after four months. The American Mercury was next edited by Mencken's former assistant Charles Angoff. At first, the magazine was considered to be moving to the Left. In January 1935, The American Mercury was purchased from Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., by Lawrence E. Spivak. The magazine's longtime business manager, Spivak announced that he would take an active role as publisher. Paul Palmer, former Sunday editor of the New York World, replaced Angoff as editor, and playwright Laurence Stallings was named literary editor. Radio and television Spivak revived the Mercury for a brief but vigorous period — Mencken, Nathan, and Angoff contributed essays to the magazine again. Spivak created a company to publish the magazine, Mercury Publications. Soon the company began publishing other magazines, including Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine (1941) and The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction in 1949. In 1945 as editor, Lawrence Spivak created a radio program called American Mercury Presents "Meet the Press". It started on television on November 6, 1947, as Meet the Press. In 1946 the Mercury merged with the democratic-socialist magazine Common Sense. By 1950, the Mercury was owned by Clendenin J. Ryan. He changed the magazine's name to The New American Mercury. Ryan was the financial angel for Ulius Amoss, a former Office of Strategic Services agent who specialized in operating spy networks behind the Iron Curtain to destabilize Communist governments and the