The artistic covers gave way in the 1960s to photographs of the Beatles, politicians, Klansmen and hippies. Fiction and poetry yielded to investigative reporting as the Post tried to compete with television and newsmagazines like Life and Look.

But mass-market magazines suffered as reading habits changed, more people watched television and specialty publications became popular, Husni said.

The Post ceased publication in 1969, crumpling under financial pressure the TV-print war placed on parent Curtis Publishing. SerVaas' father, Beurt, revived the magazine in 1971 as a quarterly publication after Rockwell announced on television that Beurt SerVaas was considering bringing back the Post, generating broad interest.

The magazine, now published six times a year, has been in the family since, with Joan SerVaas becoming publisher in 2007. It is now owned by a not-for-profit group set up by the SerVaas family that also owns children's magazines Jack and Jill, Humpty Dumpty and Turtle.

As part of its redesign, the magazine has appointed an editorial advisory board that boasts Osgood, former Reader's Digest editor-in-chief Jackie Leo and Richard F. Snow, former editor-in-chief of American Heritage magazine.

While Husni is skeptical about the magazine's future, media strategist Lou Ann Sabatier of Falls Church, Va., notes that the Post has a "brand aura" that has endured despite changes in owners and formats.

"I think there's a hunger for this," she said, referring to the Post's new perspective-driven approach. "In publishing, it's timing. I think the timing is very good for them."

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