“The conquering feminine”: Women Journalists and the People’s Friend Magazine, 1869–1905

The People’s Friend was the most popular penny magazine in Scotland in the late Victorian era and still publishes today as a leading women’s magazine. This article examines the magazine’s development from a literary miscellany in 1869 to an illustrated women’s magazine by the turn of the twentieth century. Women journalists in Dundee were integral to this transition, and their careers and literary productions cultivated a distinct feminine sphere in late Victorian Scotland. This article charts the impact of these women, particularly Jessie M. King (1862–1947), on the development of the People’s Friend and popular magazine culture in Scotland.