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Hugh Hefner
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Hugh Hefner
Hugh Hefner Hugh Hefner, 2009.

Hugh Hefner

American publisher and entrepreneur
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Also known as: Hugh Marston Hefner
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Quick Facts
In full:
Hugh Marston Hefner
Born:
April 9, 1926, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
Died:
September 27, 2017, Los Angeles, California (aged 91)
Founder:
“Playboy”

Hugh Hefner (born April 9, 1926, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.—died September 27, 2017, Los Angeles, California) was an American magazine publisher and entrepreneur who founded (1953) Playboy magazine.

Hefner, Hugh
Hefner, HughHugh Hefner with the waitstaff of the original Playboy Club, Chicago, 1960.

After serving in the U.S. Army (1944–46), Hefner attended the University of Illinois, graduating in 1949. Four years later he created the men’s magazine Playboy. Its intellectually respectable articles and forthright philosophy of hedonism made Playboy a major influence on the sexual revolution of the 1960s. Hefner later expanded his enterprise into nightclubs and other entertainment media.

This article was most recently revised and updated by Encyclopaedia Britannica.