As the U.S. was experiencing the economic expansion of the post-World War II period, Fortune magazine began collecting information on the largest companies in its 1953 series “The Changing American Market.”
However, the data that the Fortune staff was compiling was primarily for internal use. It wasn’t until 1955, when then-assistant managing editor of the magazine, Edgar P. Smith, argued that readers would be interested in the information, and he turned out to have made the correct bet.
