Past Inductees

Garry C. Myers III
CEO
Highlights for Children Inc.
(Posthumous)
2005

Bio | Acceptance Speech from Kent Johnson

GARRY CLEVELAND MYERS III was chief executive officer of Highlights for Children, Inc., publisher of the magazine by the same name and five wholly owned subsidiaries: Boyds Mills Press, Inc.; Early Years, Inc.; SDE, Inc.; Teachers' Publishing Group, Inc.; and Zaner-Bloser, Inc. until his sudden death in January 2005. Highlights For Children, which will celebrate its 60th anniversary in 2006, has the largest paid circulation of any general interest periodical for juveniles. It is also one of two remaining family-owned magazines, according to a review of the top 100 magazines.

Myers III was closely involved with the company since his grandparents Garry Cleveland Myers, Ph.D., and Caroline Clark Myers founded the magazine in 1946. Myers began working as a mailroom clerk at the Columbus offices at age 15 in the summer of 1960. His parents, Garry C. Myers, Jr. and Mary M. Myers, were critically important in the magazine's achieving success in the marketplace as president and vice president, respectively, until their deaths in December 1960.

Myers III moved to Austin, Texas with his four siblings following the death of his parents. In 1964 he entered Allegheny College in Meadville, Pennsylvania, and the next year enlisted in the U.S. Army for four years. He served as a Spanish linguist at Monterey, California, Panama and Washington, D.C. In 1972 he earned an M.B.A. specializing in marketing at the University of Michigan.

At 24 years old and still in the Army, Myers III was elected to the board of directors of Highlights for Children, Inc., in 1971. Despite being a board member, the idea of working for Highlights was not then attractive to him, so he began his business career with ALCOA in 1973 as a sales representative. Due to a downsizing at ALCOA, Myers III joined Highlights in 1975 as a management information analyst.

In 1978 he became vice president of mail sales and promotion, and in 1980, president of the corporation. He was named chief executive officer in 1981.

Myers III served almost six years on the DMA Ethics Operating Committee and was also on the Magazine Publishers Association Governmental Affairs Committee. He served for several years as chairman of the Classroom Publishers Association and served as treasurer of the Direct Selling Association.

He was married to Melanie Reamy and had two sons. Myers III read extensively about business and international politics, and explored the Internet and on-line services to keep up with the company's current investigations of the potential of electronic media.

He was a member of the American Booksellers Association, American Management Association, Association for Supervisors of Curriculum Development, Classroom Publishers Association, Direct Marketing Association, Direct Selling Association, Association of Educational Publishers, International Reading Association, and Magazine Publishers Association.