Matthew Culligan, 83; Media Supersalesman Led Curtis Publishing

Matthew Culligan, 83, the media supersalesman and former president of the magazine behemoth Curtis Publishing, which owned the Saturday Evening Post among others, died Jan. 31 in Newhall of complications from a stroke.

The native New Yorker served as a company commander in Europe during World War II and lost an eye to a grenade in the Battle of the Bulge, ever after wearing a distinctive black eye patch.

At war’s end, Culligan began his media career as an ad salesman for Good Housekeeping magazine, and by 1962 had worked his way up to president of the Curtis firm.

Credited with cutting costs and raising revenues, he personally went on speaking tours and sought advertising from executives of the nation’s 200 top corporations, requesting “amusing anecdotes” for his sales pitches from none other than President Kennedy. But Culligan resigned in 1964 after the Post became embroiled in several legal and internal battles that caused advertisers to lose faith.

Culligan later served as an official with the U.S. Information Agency and as president of Mutual Broadcasting Co. He also wrote 11 books, and in one attributed his success to “an innate Irish facility for conversation.”