The People's Friend ?

I didn't realise it was that old!
My mother bought it every week and passed it on to me.
I especially liked trying out the recipies. I still have recipies which I cut out from it many moons ago.

Of course one of our very own Gransnetters has had her work published in it. ?☺️

My aunt took several women's mags and passed them on to me. The People's Friend was the only one I couldn't bring myself to read.

Ah - memories of my grandmother.

I was lucky enough to be invited to the People's Friend 150th anniversary party last week. It was great. Everyone was so friendly. The staff are exactly as nice as you'd hope they would be. It seems like a happy family with many members of staff having worked there for years and years. Among many others I met the knitting pattern checker and the lady who cuts the dodgy bits out of my stories!

cuts the dodgy bits out of my stories!
would those be the dodgy bits which could corrupt the morals of either young or old Jane10?

My MIL always took The People's Friend and I used to read it whenever I went to her house.

My mother was reading the People's Friend when she was in labour with me. Apparently that is why she endowed me with two very couthy Scottish Names

Jane I was hoping you would post
And how nice that you were invited to the birthday event.
Now there's a job A knitting pattern checker .
I'm sure that there are no dodgy bits in your stories.
Am I allowed to ask how long you have been writing for The People's Friend?

Nice to know there is a family atmosphere, as there can't be many things in life that connects the generations.
I wonder if my great-grans were also readers.
When times were hard I expect one copy would be passed between friends and neighbours.
My paternal grandmother would send copies to my aunt in the U.S..

I hope that Jane10 didn't think I was being serious!

As a child I used to “help” in my granny’s paper shop and I remember all the ladies who came in every week for their People’s Friend”
My father started his writing career with DC Thomson in the Sunday Post and the Courier (Plus The Bulletin, but that was in Glasgow and not DC Thomson)

My Mum read it too. After my Dd1s christening our family had a photo in the letters page. I think it was because she had 4 GPs and 5 GGPs.

I`ve liked People`s Friend for several years. I only buy it occasionally, but always enjoy the read, also the scenic pictures on the front cover.

In answer to various questions, I've been writing stories for them for about three years now. Obviously the sex and violence and swearing are cut out by the editing lady!
Actually the most recently published story was in question due to its being potentially 'fattist'! This was because I wrote that a bride's dress was a 'triumph of upholstery'. The fiction editor didn't want to offend readers. However, her concern was dismissed although a 'for God's sake' was cut out. I never mind them cutting or changing words. They pay on acceptance of a story so I feel its their property then. I'm usually informed a couple of weeks before a story is published but that can be ages after they've bought it.

I think one of our fellow GN'ers has close family links with The Peoples Friend but I wont say anything else.
She may post about it herself.

Yes. She PM'd me about it. Hope she sees this thread and explains.

I used to love that wee paper when I was a girl. Mum got People's Friend and Home Chat.

Jane I'm actually quite pleased they pointed out how such a phrase could be upsetting.
Fat people are so often the butt of jokes; the "baddies" in books, insulted in the street, supermarket and restaurants - and as for the bullying of fat children - don't get me started.
So it's rather nice to know someone cares.

But Bradfordlass72 they printed it!
It was a comic piece about a little boy's perception of a wedding. There was more to object to than that I'd thought.

My gran was the only one in our family to be a fan of People's Friend and she was very pleased to hear that I was to be working for the magazine (in my own little way).
In the summers of 67 and 68 I spent the uni vacations assembling free gifts and inserting them into the mag's.
We were based in Dundee's city centre and many students made up the team.

Sometimes the gifts were for the Beano or Dandy!

A great favourite was the sewing kit with a card of threads, a couple of needles and buttons plus several safety pins - all tucked into a tiny plastic pocket. They were packed into trays until needed and then brought out for us to work out way through piles of magazines popping in the gifts.

I wonder just how exciting it was for the readers who received the 'bonus' ones as we couldn't resist, just once in a while, putting in 2 or even 3!

It was a happy, chatty and undemanding job paying precisely £10 per week!

Very nice summer job mcem.

My own grandma bought The People's Friend in the early 1950's and I remember her reading me the little Willie Wagtail stories. ?

mcem, my mother (and I), loved those free gifts! I still have a needle threader in my sewing basket.

My hairdresser always has a couple of copies in her pile of magazines for clients to read

marydoll I'd love to think I put it in your magazine! Forgot about the needle threader in my last post!

I remember doing competitions on the children's page and winning a knitting set when I was about 7.

It's all go at the People's Friend these days. Time to give it another go?