As a lover of maps I also instinctively thought of USA Today. I can't locate a source right now, but I remember reading that USA Today's multi-color, full page

As a lover of maps I also instinctively thought of USA Today. I can't locate a source right now, but I remember reading that USA Today's multi-color, full page weather map on the back was way ahead of its time, before any other publications were dedicating that type of effort/cost/space to cartographic data viz. It gave me a new appreciation for USA Today, which mostly I had written off as "that free unread paper outside my hotel room door". But they played a role in bringing beautiful maps to the masses.