Welcome, Readers

In 1969, the Grateful Dead released the song “Uncle John’s Band,” which opens with description of an ambitious beginning: “Well, the first days are the hardest days, don’t you worry any more. When life looks like easy street, there is danger at your door.” Their wisdom holds true today. The first days are the hardest, and danger does seem to strike when things look easiest. Plus, everyone who works at Bosworth lives in a silver mine, and we call it beggar's tomb.

Bosworth’s inaugural issue stands before you, the product of sweat, tears, and literally gallons of steroids. We’ve worked hard to bring you this online humor magazine, and as result, feel compelled for whatever reason to narrate a bit of the process that went into this product you see today.

All good stories begin with a girl. This one doesn’t. Instead, it begins with a University of Iowa graduate student named Matt Lavin. He sat in a coffee shop in Iowa City one day this winter, staring on and off at an attractive waitress who found him strange and creepy and taking notes on an idea he had for an online humor magazine. He wrote down ideas for a title, a mission statement, and a series of columns and recurring features. He thought up a slogan, and even sketched out a web design concept.

Long story short, a group of street toughs known as the Allegros happened across Lavin on his way home from the coffee shop, assaulted him, stole his notebook, and left him for dead in a ditch. We started working on the magazine, honing Lavin’s amateurish first attempt into something slightly readable. A few weeks later, Lavin arrived at our doorstep, furious that we had stolen most of his ideas. We beat him up once again, but this time he started crying. We all felt sorry for him, so we decided to hire him on as a proofreader, which is why we have so many typos in our magazine.

But now, the components of this experiment are all but complete. Hopefully, the days get easier as we go.

For more information about Bosworth’s mission, click here.