Sewing Patterns and The Queen of Fashion
In 1870, Scottish immigrant James McCall began designing and printing his own line of sewing patterns. As a means of advertising his patterns, McCall founded a four-page fashion journal entitled The Queen: Illustrating McCall's Bazaar Glove-Fitting Patterns.
When McCall died in 1884, his widow became president of McCall Company, and hired Mrs. George Bladsworth as magazine editor. Mrs. Bladsworth held the position until 1891. Though still mainly a vehicle to sell McCall's sewing patterns, The Queen began to publish homemaking and handiwork information, and by 1890 had expanded to 12 pages. In 1891, the magazine's name became The Queen of Fashion, and the cost for a year's subscription was 30 cents.
In 1893, James Henry Ottley took over the McCall Company. He increased the subscription price to 50 cents a year, increased the number of pages to between 16 and 30 per issue, and began to publish articles on children's issues, health, beauty, and foreign travel. In order to reflect the magazine's expanded range of topics, the name was changed to McCall's Magazine—The Queen of Fashion in 1897. In time, the name would be shortened to McCall's.
Despite the name changes, for many years information on McCall's Patterns filled an average of 20 percent of the magazine's pages.
Read more about this topic: Mc Call's
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