Issue-based Online Magazine

Any suggestion as to how to build an multi-issue magazine site similar to this:
http://www.bu.edu/bostonia/fall13/

I need the current issue to display independently of the past issues with the ability to access them all if the site visitor chooses so. Unfortunately the very few plugins that I found failed to deliver on their promise and I didn’t consider a multi-site because it would be an overkill given the not so large content.

Any advice would very much appreciated.