Womens Magazines of Yesteryear.

Marmight mention of “ The Lady” mag, always brings to mind the comedic character portrayed by David Williams… I’m a Lady
However apart from being a well known must read for those seeking jobs as Nannies/au pairs/ and those looking for companion/housekeepers they advertise Holiday Cottages and my Mum got our first cottage holiday in Devon from there, really gorgeous and lovely thoughtful owners. This was, of course before it became as expensive as San Tropes (sp?)

My Mum took The Lady (heaven knows why) The Mother’s Union magazine and latterly Woman’s Weekly, Woman & Saga which actually had some really good content. As I was away at school I never got past Robin & Girl at home and was allowed the Children’s Newspaper & Look & Learn to be sent to school. I thought them boring ….
I gave DH a lifetime subscription to Saga as a joke for his 50th birthday. Best move ever; it still arrives each month. Think it probably works out at around 5p a copy, if not free by now ?

Yes Grandmarderbey I also hated the Look and Learn educational magazines. The school swots always seemed to take them.

In the late 1960s we had The Book of Life - a very dareing encyclopaedia of the human body, it came every month rolled in brown paper then later Golden Hands - another encyclopaedia, of knitting and sewing , they were intended to be sent for binding but that never happened. Also for years it seemed to me, my Dad ordered a magazine for me called Look and Learn it was a floppy newspaper type material, all black and white, few pictures and extremely boreing.

Mum and a friend used to swap. Mum had woman and her (richer) friend passed on woman's own, woman's realm and My Weekly.

I dont really like many of the current magazines. I usually go for special interest ones (eg family history or cookery) and occasionally something like Coast.

My Mum only took Woman's Journal, a glossy, monthly periodical which had excellent serials which I usually read as soon as she had finished with it. A number of Georgette Heyer's Regency romances were serialised in the Journal as well as novels by Elizabeth Goudge and - I think - crime stories by Ngaio Marsh. Mum and I devoured all these stories. There were also excellent knitting patterns. I took to knitting in my teens and at least two very successful jackets came from WJ patterns. Looking back, I realise that the WJ was quite self-consciously up-market and aimed itself higher than the other - weekly - magazines. It suited my mum down to the ground! Another monthly mag in our house was Stitchcraft, full of exciting...knitting patterns. The People's Friend was a family tradition as my grandfather and great-grandfather had both been editors of that venerable publication. Its cosy fiction and useful home hints made it an essential and very popular magazine and apparently it still is.

My Nan used to have a monthly? needlework/craft magazine, can’t remember the name. They gave away a dressmaking pattern with each issue. She used to cut them up and put string through to hang up to use as toilet paper. Such a treat! It was so much softer than the normal newspaper ?

My mum used to have Woman and when she’d read it would exchange it for Woman’s Own with a neighbour. My auntie used to bring Woman’s Weekly when she visited and that would then be exchanged for the Woman’s Own. I was always given the children’s page with a story about a family of robins but never very impressed with it!

my gran got the my weekly and peoples friend every week, i was 13 in 1976 and would take them to bed and read the stories, i felt so grown up, she also got the weekly news and the sunday post (i love the broons and oor wullie) she would post them so my uncle in australia could read what was happening in the uk.

I read Jackie as a teenager. My Mum liked Woman's Weekly and Woman. My Step gran used to read Red Star and Family Star. I used to read them all when they had finished. Loved them all.

I read Marje Proops in my mum's Woman's Mirror and then bought various women's magazines myself while still a young girl and then teenager.
It was years before I understood what was meant when someone referred to their 'lover' in an agony letter.
I was determined to use tampons, not towels, when the time came, based on persuasive ads in the magazines - although I was still a bit vague about why I'd need them.
And I became quite good at pairing up town & county names from reading the addresses at the foot of readers' letters.

My mother took Woman's Weekly. She always read 'The Robins' to me!

Jackie magazine in the 70s! She in the 80s and a bit of Cosmo and Vogue. Liked Good Housekeeping. Would probably still like it, but don’t buy mags any more. Just forgot about them.

I liked "Titbits" and there used to be a magazine called "ME" and one called "Eve" but they folded, and I was sad because they were really good.

My mum used to buy Woman and Woman's Own and when I was little I remember sitting cuddled up on her lap whilst she read to me an article about the actress Margaret Lockwood. I even remember the actresses' daughter being called Julia.
What a very happy memory

I went off womens magazines many moons ago because they all seemed to be repeating them selves.

I prefer this one, but its not just for women.
www.bestofbritishmag.co.uk/

My Mum bought whichever magazine had the best knitting patterns that week, usually Woman's Weekly. My gran would occasionally buy The Lady, or People's Friend, I never took much interest in their magazines. Sometimes I was allowed a copy of Bunty or Judy, but Mum thought comics were a waste of money, why not just read a book, and we had plenty of those at home and a library near by. When I could afford to buy my own magazines of I liked National Geographic or anything craft or hobby related. I still buy magazines if we go to Tesco, they have the best selection. But I can't stand celebrity magazines, BORING!! really not interested what they do with their lives. When we went away on holiday I'd buy the bumper summer edition of People's Friend, or something similar, to read on the beach.

I used to buy Honey, taking the cover hairdo to my hairdresser, much to their horror. My gran used to pass Woman's Weekly to my mum, later she bought it and passed it on to me and I now pass it to one of my DDs. She says it is very relaxing and sometimes finishes the crosswords with my small GS! During lockdown I have indulged in The Lady on a couple of occasions and struggled with The Ladygram that really gets the brain going.

My Nana used to get Red Letter and Red Star. We used to go to the park and she would read the stories to me - I must have been about 2 or 3 and they were love stories - highly unsuitable, but I got to spend time with my beloved Nana. I learned to read from the cartoons in them.

I went from reading Fab 208 to Woman and Woman's Own - I thought I was very adult!

My aunt used to read Woman's Own. When I visited her my cousin and I used to read it together. There was always an advert for Tampax. My cousin and I were always drawn to this and completely bamboozled by the words "internal protection". We had no idea what it could possibly mean. We were about 10 years old at the time and very innocent. This was in the 1950s.

My elderly mother used to buy My Weekly when I was a child. Her friend used to buy Woman’s Realm and they would save them up for a month then swap. My mother loved the knitting patterns in each magazine. They were passed on to me to read afterwards. The stories in My Weekly were very good in the 70’s and sometimes would be serialised. I never waste money on magazines I’d sooner but a book because all of the advertisements and celeb gossip just bore me rigid. The price of magazines these days is scandalous and I begrudge the money. I sometimes flick through the pages of the two most popular ones that pay a fortune to have the rights to a celeb wedding or birth of a baby when I’m in the hairdresser’s chair but I get angry that they’ve sold their tiny baby’s precious first photos for thousands to make their huge bank accounts just that bit huger.

My mum always had a People's Friend when I was younger, I never remember her reading any others. She loved her Mills& Boon's and took bags of them with her to the caravan for the whole summer, along with huge bars of Whole Nut to munch on while she was reading. That made her so happy bless her.

Granmarderby10

I remember there was a little section in Woman’s Weekly called the Robins or The Robin Family

oh yes , it was Woman's weekly not the People's friend, the
Robin Family, I was only allowed to read that bit!

I write stories for them.They have to be positive and have a happy ending

Just like real life then? Oh, if only!

4allweknow People's Friend is very much still published and has a large circulation. Nobody ever seems to admit to buying it but the distribution figures are very high so some people are. There's not only the People's Friend out every week but also a People's Friend special out every three weeks. I write stories for them. They have to be positive and have a happy ending.