ennui, 1907

ennui (one of the trendy magazines that never never capitalized the first letter of its name) was the preferred monthly journal of those who preferred to ...well you know.  Not interested in this or that, they seldom looked forward to their ennui each month, but a subscription just seemed to drag on forever and a day. Lacking any focus in life, getting the subscription stopped was just more than they could focus on, so that wasn't an option, either.  Still published today, each copy of ennui is universally greeted by its subscriber with a "meh" and then tossed onto the coffee table where it gathers dust until someone gets around to just throwing it away.

Strumpet, 1790

Strumpet, or "The Monthly Rag" as it was known to its readers, infused itself with "all things that a tart, trollope or prostitute should know."  Articles covered the the practicle (That Ooze Coming From Your Cooz, Diseases of Love That You Should See A Barber About) as well as the Whimsical - the serialized version of "Peter's Explorations of Virginia" - were also popular.

In 1865 the magazine changed its name to The Hooker's Monthly.  Publication ceased in 1968 when the concept of "Free Love" really became free to all. Outstanding content and the magazine's staff were then merged with Business Weeky, since "screwing someone over for a healthy profit" now happened in Board Rooms around the world.

Rubens, 1877

As strange as it may seem - before there was a Calvin Klein, there was a time when a woman of ample proportions was a valuable asset, an object of desire, and the aspiration of many a man who found their lusciousness an automatic ticket to get ones "schwing" on.  Rubens, named for the dutch artist and lover of babes who got back on, catered to those curvy cuties and their love of being pampered. Milk baths, being feted by wealthy men, gowns, corsets and summers in Newport, Florence and Bergdoff's - ah, such was their way of life. Popular with all, even those born with a naturally lean body type, the magazine prospered into the early 1920s when  skinny, chain smoking, flat chested flappers became all the rage.  And because one's beads did not hang in a straight line down ones chest when one possessed a 42" EE cup, Rubens faded into the Pantheon of the passed periodical.  Tis a pity.

War Widows Weekly, 1864

War Widows Weekly was a popular magazine in the North during the Civil War, and its motto "She is more to be pitied than cenusred" was later turned into a popular tune.  WWW, as it was known to its readership help War Widows to fill the empty void by by being widowed by the Civil War.  A terrible fate to befall a woman.  Easy come, easy go.

Primal Fashion, 25,000 BC

Why, with the world still fresh and warm from God's oven, and early man unaware of things like self -awareness and bromodosis, did the earliest humans need a fashion magazine? Because even early woman had a right to be beautiful.  From fashion to guest editor Cowen Cowie's five minutes of zen before a party, each issue of Primal Fashion packed more into a magazine than most could fit onto a stone tablet in cuniform.  Of course fashions and features change over time.  Today when we go clubbing, it has different meaning...a much different meaning, of course.

Worth Repeating: Empress Magazine, "Novembre", 1801

Copyright 2010 Stuart Koblentz

At some point we all have inner doubts.  Do we measure up to our own high standards?  Do we need to? Do we measure up to our subject's standards, such as they are? Do we even care? Whatever we may think of our subjects, when "putsch" comes to shove, will they die for us, or grab their favorite goat and go off until the coast is clear?

Such was the theme of the self-esteem issue of Empress Magazine in November 1801. Its one thing to be the Empress, its something all together different to be "tres fabulous"  in the esteemed halls of hallowed history.  So this issue looked at one Catherine II, a mousy little courtesan who went on to be the biggest thing that ever happened to sex until Xaviera took London!  And what made Catherine so "Great"?  Well according to the magazine, it was all in the careful selection of her lovers.  All 1,001 of them.

The Night is Half Gone, 1925

The Night is Half Gone, A Fortnightly Journal of the Cresent City was a popular periodical found in all proper homes.  As popular as it was, the magazine during its life was unable to educate people on the differences between a Beignet and Ben-Wa Dancing Eggs.   Upon the death of magazines, the periodical made the jump to web as a blog reaching an audience of romantics with fabulous taste and beefy desires.

MP MrPeenee Magazine

The forerunner to the popular blog of the same name, MrPeenee tackled the issues of the day, week and year.  In its April 1821 issue the magazine introduced the concept of the Brunch.  And the rest, as they say, is history, Bitches.

Modern Step Mother, 1948

Copyright 2010 SJ Koblentz

There are magazines such as Good Housekeeping and Better Homes & Gardens - magazines for the young homemaker, but what to do for the many, many women who find themselves in the awkward position of being a child's stepmother?  For these women, who walked a razors edge of being the wife their husband's desire, and a surrogate to the children that he had for a lousy excuse of a first wife, Modern StepMother was created in 1939. 

Modern StepMother picked up where HomeWreckers left off.  Each issue contained hints for women who never wanted children, but suddenly discovered that they had a nest full of whiney, bacteria laden kiddies to contend with.  One of the records that the magazine could crow about was that it contained more pages of advertisements for boarding schools, military acdemies, convent schools and homes for disturbed children than any other magazine.

Lethal Homes & Gardens, 1955

{inspired by}

Lethal Homes & Gardens found it core audience among women who know what they want, and the men who want them.  Each issue was jammed packed with all sorts of useful knowledge - everything from how to pick a lock on a home safe to the joys of self indulgence.  The magazines motto was "Take No Shit; Take No Prisoners. But Be Kind About It."

British Colonial Traveller, 1889

Like ENNUI, British Colonial Traveller (with two "L's" - it was a copyright issue as not to confuse people with British Traveler, the newsweekly) was designed to help people of the Empire plan their travels abraod.  However unlike ENNUI - which focused on the leasure class, British Colonial Traveller focused on the more rambunctious parts of the empire and safari's and the like.  While mortal peril was a constant for the highly civilized Englishman and his brethern, Traveller tried to bridge the cultural gaps that would otherwise leave a gentleman at a loss on where to get high tea in Rangoon, a proper Prostitute in Tibet or a decent meal in Dublin, Ireland. Should any of these instances present itself and language a barrier existed (Ireland, for example), the periodical provided helpful phrases such as "DO YOU HAVE ANY FOOD FIT FOR HUMAN CONSUMPTION?" and "DOES YOUR LOT WASH AFTER USING THE LOO?"

Homewreckers, July 1947

The Second Wife's Monthly published its first issue in July 1920.  The periodical devoted itself to helping the "woman with dreams and aspirations to become a lady by the time she was 30 years old."  During the depression, when situations became more dire, it changed its name to simply HOMEWRECKERS to save precious money spent on ink, and changed its tag line to "If you can have a happy home, break one up."

Popular with bar maids, secretaries, housekeepers and exotic dancers, the magazine had many popular features, including "What would you do?" its monthly help column and tips on custom lingeries that offered tips on how to save money by making crotchless panties at home, and the like.

HOMEWRECKERS Magazine published its final issue in 1975.  By then everyone was swinging and taking on multiple sex partners, and the decrease in Burlesque houses had cut so significantly into its circulation that the magazine was someone redundent.  Said its last publisher Lew D' Trude "We may have given generations of broads tips on anal sex, but we never lost our class."

Careergals, June 1964

Careergals was the magazine for careergals - that special group of women that refused to find fulfillment in being a normal woman and housewife.  Each different edition of Careergals came jam packed with things that businessladies needed to know as they climbed the stepstool of success in the 1960s. 

The magazine finally folded in 1972 as more woman became offended by men referring to them as "gals" and "broads". 

Said its finally editor, J. Stanley Marchmont to his 60 employees and its token female writer: "When women start dictating to us what we men think Careergals Magazine should be, then its time for us to shut this chick magazine down."

United Kingdom DENTURIST

{VIA}

Brits are a merry lot.  Chin up, shoulder back and tut tut and all that.  But when it comes to their teeth they are a jolly lot, they love to smile and all, but you wouldn't want to kiss them.  A wee bit snaggle toothed for most.  Millionaires should be rolling in money in the nation, selling Dentures left right and center, but strangly, they are not.  The UNITED KINGDOM DENTURIST existed to bolster that wobbly lot - reminding them that with the aid of false teeth, England could indeed become a beauty spot.

Schadenfreude, The Newsweekly, June 15, 1958

Schadenfreude, The Newsweekly, was never afraid to cover the stories that its readers would have much preferred that they sweep under the rug.  The alarming trend of girl on girl violence - which was later tied to televised games of roller derby - shocked middle America in the 1950s.  Why, you ask.  "Girl fights are as old as time, you point out.  Well, its because by 1957 "good girls" were tired of simply sticking their tongues out of their mouths and shrieking "Nanny Nanny Boo Boo" at other girls.  Without another outlet, they borrowed a few moves from the Boise Bombshells and starting taking great pleasure in slapping, scratching kicking, punching each other.  To counter this, Mattel introduced the Barbie doll, which they could dress up and comb its hair.  But all Barbie did was push the anger just below the surface, and by 1967 it started to seething to the top... in more rebellious forms.

Schadenfreude, The Newsweekly, June 15, 1617

What can we say.  Its human nature to take some satisfaction in the suffering of someone else, even if it makes Jesus weep.  Napoleon's final defeat.  The Fall of Hitler. Parker " Jolly" Wentworth's missed polo goal attempt during the 1940 Southampton Polo Club's Invitational Tournament.  Its all good.  Yet for as appalled as they were to discover that the "rape" in the context of the Leucippus daughters simply meant "kidnapping" and "marriage under diress", the Dutch were oddly attracted to this painting, voting it the painting they would most like to have in their windmill's for 1617. 

Bee's Knees, March 13, 1923

Copyright 2009 Stuart J. Koblentz

Good Golly, the folks at home just thought that the Bee's Knees (the word "the" was never capitalized) was just about the snappiest rag in its day!  Filled with all sorts of good gumbo and if it was in the Knees then it had to be so!

Worth Repeating, Empress Magazine, Brumaire 1801

Copyright 2009 Stuart Koblentz, All Rights Reserved

Though it had a limited audience, Empress Monthly was a favorite with its readers because it understood what they were up against.

One would think that its subscribers, who had all the comforts afforded royalty, would have a full dance card in life's little fete. Truth be told, aside from producing a male heir, the only other duties were dressing well, and appearing at the ribbon cutting ceremonies whenever a new bakery or meat rendering company opened its doors. Wait, I take that back; as Empress you changed you clothes a great deal - like six or seven times a day. And with all that dressing and undressing, there was no time left for being able to take a mad lark every now and then and go junking like the commoners do - but they, of course, called it "shopping."

For the readers of Empress, life was made up of little trade offs; and there is that constant reminder that with power comes great responsibility. A palace here, a castle there, and all of those furs, the gold and ah yes, the jewels. But at what price? Well, you can't have everything in life; if one can not roll in the hay with the farmer's son because it would be slumming, then one must be content with starting a multi-national conflict over the batting of your eyes at some other Queen's prince royale, or having the head of the Church of State drawn and quartered for disapproving of your extreme wealth, and good fortune, no?

Indeed, it is lonely at the top.

KVETCH, January 1965

Copyright 2009 Stuart J. Koblentz

KVETCH, the International Magazine of Complainers, everywhere served to remind the unhappy, that they too had a legitimacy to their being.  Each issue was jammed packed with stories about those who give and give and give and give some more only to have the door slammed in the readers face, a cold meal served when everyone else gets something nice and hot and seat in a drafty corner.  Its most popular feature was its Seek and Find, which the readers always complained was printed in letters that were to small and words that were too hard to find.

Gourmand Magazine, March 1885

Copyright 2009 Stuart Koblentz

Ahhh, Gourmand Magazine!  The magazine of conspicuous consumption! The magazine renowned for its celebration of shear, and unapologetic, gluttony that reached its Zenith in the era of American Splendor in the late 19th Century.  Appearing on each cover was the motto of the periodical, "Jus est Vita", which roughly translated into English as meaning "Gravy is Life".  Each month, readers were taken to places that they could only imagine.  Bakeries, confectioners, beef houses and Bavarian Breweries - where those with a lush desire for nothing but the best (and as much of it as it was humanly possible to consume) could be had.  Even Hetty Green was a subscriber - long cold nights spent lovingly looking through the lush pages, representing the unbridled desire that even the Witch of Wall Street could not supress.  That is the real meaning of Kismet.

Two things lead to the eventual closure of Gourmand, however.  First, there were very, very short life spans of the readers who seemed to be plagued with all manner of health problems.  Gout, apoplexy, catarrh, lumbago and bursitis - all doomed the readership.  And if that wasn't enough, there was the Progressive Era, with all of its repudiations and stances on going back to nature and eating diets that couldn't keep a squirrel alive let alone a 450 pound man who would have a Chateaubriand for a night time snack and think nothing of it.  Oh, the dreams we had those nights as well.