Leatherneck Magazine
Leatherneck Magazine, formally Leatherneck Magazine of the Marines and often called simply Leatherneck, is a magazine for United States Marines published by the Marine Corps Association in Quantico, Virginia. It is produced at Marine Corps Base Quantico, home of the association's headquarters. Its purpose, in the words attributed to its early patron, is to tell the Marine Corps' story, in contrast to its sister publication, the Marine Corps Gazette, which serves as the Corps' professional journal. Leatherneck is available in magazine form, online and on a mobile application, is published monthly, and was reported in the mid-2010s to have more than 40,000 monthly readers.
Origin as The Quantico Leatherneck in 1917
Leatherneck began as a newspaper published by off-duty Marines at Marine Corps Base Quantico in 1917. A Marine Corps Association history records that in 1917 two enlisted Marines received permission from Brigadier General John A. Lejeune, the Quantico commander, to publish a paper for Marines, and that in time it became Leatherneck magazine. A 1964 paper prepared for Leatherneck Association members, quoted in the association's history, gives a fuller version: in 1917 three enlisted Marines at Quantico decided that they and their fellow Marines should have a paper containing material of specific interest to Marines, and, on an off-duty basis and with assistance from the Army-Navy YMCA, they published the first issue of The Quantico Leatherneck on November 17, 1917.
It therefore started as the base newspaper at Quantico while Lejeune was base commander. In 1918 the word Quantico was dropped from its name. The title itself derives from the slang term leatherneck for a United States Marine, referring to the leather-lined collar, or stock, of the original Marine uniform. The magazine has sometimes been described as a Reader's Digest for Marines, a comparison that reflects its general-interest approach for a Marine audience rather than a narrowly technical one.
Under the Marine Corps Institute in Washington
In 1920, with the formation of the Marine Corps Institute by Commandant John A. Lejeune, Leatherneck became an official Marine Corps publication under the auspices of the institute, and it moved to Headquarters Marine Corps in Washington, D.C. The association history explains that Lejeune placed Leatherneck under the Marine Corps Institute, and both moved to Washington after he became Commandant. In 1925 its format changed from a newspaper to a magazine.
By 1926 Leatherneck had grown to a colourful 64-page monthly with photographs, jokes, cartoons, poetry and reports from the field. That mix — service information alongside humour, verse and field reporting — established the pattern that distinguished it from a purely professional journal. Its popularity in that form, the association history notes, continued thereafter, and its base in Washington placed it at Headquarters Marine Corps during the interwar expansion of the institute's educational work for Marines.
World War II and the Leatherneck Association
During World War II, many of the Marine Corps' combat correspondents were assigned to Leatherneck. Its notoriety rose during the war, and the Marine Corps Association history records a monthly circulation of 300,000 in that period. In 1943 the Leatherneck Association was formed, and was incorporated that year, to govern the magazine. Formation of the association made the magazine more autonomous, answerable only to the Commandant. The same history notes that in 1943 the association added the red-covered Guidebook for Marines to its offerings, described there as professionally enriching.
The wartime scale was exceptional, but the post-war magazine retained a large audience and a distinct institutional home of its own, separate from the Marine Corps Association that published the Gazette. That separation — two associations, each with its own book service, magazine, insurance plan and awards programme — lasted until the 1970s and is important to understanding why Leatherneck did not come under the Marine Corps Association until that decade, even though both publications served the same Corps.
Vietnam Era and Return to Quantico
During the Vietnam War, circulation stood at 200,000 monthly, according to the association history. The Leatherneck staff, numbering more than 100 in Washington, received a Meritorious Unit Commendation for its service during that period. Leatherneck was an official Marine Corps publication until 1972, staffed primarily by active-duty Marines. That year all active-duty positions were eliminated and the magazine returned to Quantico.
The wider change came in 1972, when the Department of Defense closed the option of assigning active-duty personnel to military-related associations. The Marine Corps Association itself shifted at that time from an organisation staffed largely by active-duty Marines to a civilian workforce. For Leatherneck, the Leatherneck Association moved its offices from Henderson Hall, Arlington, Virginia, to Quantico in 1975, after it had already lost its Marine active-duty staff, and more dramatic organisational change followed.
Merger with the Marine Corps Association in 1976
In 1975 General Louis H. Wilson, Commandant and president of the Marine Corps Association, appointed a committee headed by Brigadier General P. X. Kelley to examine the advantages of merging the Leatherneck Association and the Marine Corps Association. Kelley later recalled that both associations had their own book service, magazine, insurance plan and awards programme, and that although more people read Leatherneck and its Guidebook for Marines, and its insurance programme was popular, the Leatherneck Association could support the Corps more effectively by merging. In 1976 the Leatherneck Association merged with the Marine Corps Association.
Since that merger the Marine Corps Association has continued to publish Leatherneck alongside the Marine Corps Gazette. The association's present home at Quantico, Bartlett Hall aboard Marine Corps Base Quantico, was named for former executive director Brigadier General George Bartlett and dedicated on November 10, 1986. A Marine Corps Base Quantico account of the association's centenary summarised the division of labour that survived the merger: Leatherneck is geared toward telling the story of the Marine Corps, while the Gazette talks about military art and science and provides a forum for debate about ways to improve the Corps. Retired Colonel Walt Ford, the association's publisher and editor of Leatherneck since 1999 in that account, put Lejeune's intention in similar terms, contrasting the Gazette as the professional journal with Leatherneck as the title Lejeune wanted to tell the Corps' story.
Mission and Readership
Leatherneck's stated mission is to be the magazine of Marines — yesterday, today and tomorrow. Its online presence is described as a community for Marines of all ranks, including active duty, reserve, retired Marines and Marine veterans, and their families. Content in both the association's magazines comes largely from members and others interested in Marine Corps operations, according to the association's former president and chief executive, retired Major General Ed Usher, quoted in the Quantico centenary account.
Reader figures give a sense of scale in different eras. Wartime circulation reached 300,000 monthly in World War II and 200,000 monthly during Vietnam. In a calmer period, a 2015 figure put Leatherneck at more than 40,000 monthly readers. The magazine's International Standard Serial Number is 0023-981X, and a 2021 issue imprint confirms that it is published monthly by the Marine Corps Association at Building 715, Marine Corps Base, Quantico, Virginia, with address changes directed to Leatherneck Magazine at Quantico. Opinions of authors in Leatherneck, that imprint notes, do not necessarily express the attitude of the association or the Corps.
Contents and Regular Features
From its 1926 form onward, Leatherneck has combined photographs, field reports and service stories with lighter material such as jokes, cartoons and poetry. Its media materials list sections that include Sound Off, for letters to the editor; Reunions and Requests; Sea Stories, in which Marines share tales of service; and Corps Connections, connecting the service Marine community. Those departments explain how the magazine functions socially as well as journalistically: readers use it to find one another, announce reunions, exchange memories and respond to published stories.
Stories, features and pictures from Leatherneck may be reproduced, the copyright imprint states, if they are not restricted by law or military regulations, provided proper credit is given and specific prior permission has been granted for each item. That policy reflects its role as a record of Marine life intended for circulation within the Marine community. The editor-in-chief history also marks change within that community: Colonel Mary Reinwald, United States Marine Corps (Retired), became the first female editor-in-chief in 2014.
Print and Digital Editions
Leatherneck is available in magazine form, online through the Marine Corps Association website, and on a mobile application. Digital editions of both the Gazette and Leatherneck are available monthly for online readers. In the association's centenary account, association leaders discussed preparing for a shift in readership as younger Marines received news from smartphones or tablets, while other readers preferred the paper version and some used both. At that time about 14,000 members had elected to forgo the print editions of the association's magazines and read the digital editions online instead.
The association's stated position in that account was a commitment to continue printing the magazines monthly, each with quality content and the feel of a first-class magazine, while developing digital content that would be more user-friendly for phones and tablets. Any eventual shift from predominantly paper to digital, its president said, would be driven by what readers wanted. For Leatherneck, whose audience includes veterans and families as well as serving Marines, that dual approach allows the same monthly issue to reach a barracks, a household and a phone without changing its basic identity.
Place Beside the Gazette at Quantico
Today Leatherneck and the Marine Corps Gazette are described by the Marine Corps Association as its core publications, in keeping with Lejeune's original intent for an association that would foster discussion of the history and character of the Marine Corps. The two titles are complementary rather than competing. The Gazette provides the professional forum; Leatherneck provides the narrative record — the stories, photographs, humour, reunions and sea stories through which Marines recognise their own service. Produced in Quantico, where it began on November 17, 1917, as The Quantico Leatherneck, moved to Washington for more than five decades, and returned in the 1970s, the magazine has completed a geographic circle while retaining the purpose set for it at its founding: a paper, and then a magazine, containing material of specific interest to Marines.
