For over 44 years Tom Bodkin has been the heart and soul of design at The New York Times. His job titles have included: art director, designer, design director, creative director, chief creative officer, associate managing editor, and deputy managing editor. Tom is only the second art department head to have ever been listed on the prestigious Times masthead. Tom served under more executive editors than I can count … a feat in itself.

There’s not enough podcast to detail the significance of his contribution to the Times—and to the newspaper business at large. Print and digital.

Building on the foundation of news design initiated by his predecessor, Lou Silverstein, Tom pushed major initiatives—from the change of typography and type style, to the introduction of color, to the addition of feature and news sections. He shepherded the transitions from print-only to digital-first platforms. He also took active roles in the transformative redesigns of the Travel, Arts & Leisure, and Sports Daily sections, among others. 

His influence extended to overseeing the makeup desk in the newsroom, enlarging the information graphics group and he created some of the most memorable A1 pages ever, including the arrival of a new millennium in 2000, the 9/11 attacks, Barack Obama elected as our first black president, and the ongoing coverage of the COVID pandemic. 

He’s also overseen a huge expansion of the paper’s design footprint from around 50 when he started to over 300 people now in all parts of the news and business departments.

These are milestones in the Times’ legacy—and in the global practice of design. 

But for me, Tom Bodkin is more than the sum of his accomplishments. He was my boss and is my friend. He made working, as I did for 33 years, at the Times fun. I was a senior art director (in fact, the only one for a while), one of my roles was as “consigliere”—although Tom didn’t need much counseling. He was prepared for anything, open to everything, and the most humane manager in a company where other senior-level chiefs could be, sometimes, difficult to work with.

When I left the paper, Tom put me on contract for another few years to ease my anxiety about leaving. It was hard to leave home after 33 years. It was hard to leave Tom, who was my eyes and ears at my beloved Times.

Now it is his turn to pass the baton. But before he does, we present you with this special episode of Print Is Dead (Long Live Print!) devoted to Tom Bodkin and his legacy.

But before we get to Tom, here’s Dean Baquet, former executive editor of the Times with a few thoughts about working with him. —Steven Heller