It’s amazing to me how fast things change, sometimes without us really realizing it until we see an old picture or something else triggers a memory. Recently I came across an old copy of the Ladies Home Journal (from the 1970’s, so in reality it wasn’t that old) and I had to laugh out loud at some of the articles in it…which got me doing an online search…
Louisa Knapp Curtis married Cyrus Curtis in 1875. He was the publisher of The People’s Lodge in Boston. When that business was destroyed by a fire, they moved to Pennsylvania. He then founded the Tribune and Farmer magazine and a few years later, Louisa started writing one page supplements to be included with the magazine titled, Women at Home. The additions became so popular they became a standalone magazine in February of 1883.
Originally titled Ladies Home Journal and
Practical Housekeeper, a year’s subscription cost fifty cents.By 1903 the magazine had over 1 million subscribers.
A transition from the ‘newspaper’ look to the magazine image took place and this 1885 edition was their first color cover.
The magazine was said to offer practical instructions of duties, share experiences, anecdotes, hints and recipes in housekeeping as well as domestic management, all which were sure to increase the comforts of house and home. The magazine also hosted several pages of advertisements where women or men could order everything from the latest oil lamps and flour shifters to embroidery stamps and self-adjusting toasters and everything in between!
Here is a one page section:
In my imagination I can see a young pioneer woman anxiously awaiting her next edition of the magazine and completely devouring it upon arrival.
There isn’t a magazine in my next release, The Cowboy who Caught her Eye, but there is a heroine who’s anxiously awaiting an arrival. That of her baby—however that is also what she’s hiding. Her pregnancy.
