‘Bunty’ and ‘Jackie’

‘Bunty‘ and ‘Jackie‘ magazines were both published weekly by the same company that produced ‘The Beano’ and ‘The Dandy’, namely D.C. Thomson. ‘Bunty’ had the longest run of any British magazine for girls, from 1958 to 2001, with 2,249 editions. ‘Jackie’ had the next longest run, from 1964 to 1993, with a total of 1,534 issues. Both are remembered fondly by women who read them as young teenagers, with ‘The Best Of…’ commemorative books being popular gifts.

They both featured comic-strip stories of life’s little problems at school, in friendships and family, but ‘Bunty’ also sometimes dipped into sci-fi, ghosts and witches. It had readers’ letters, competitions and puzzles and, on the back, a cut-out girl to paste onto card, with cut-out outfits tabbed to fold over the girl’s shoulders/arms/waist/legs.

‘Jackie’ aimed at the slightly older teenager and focused much more on boyfriends and romance, always in a light-hearted tone. It had beauty tips, knitting patterns, recipes, posters of pop idols and, of course, the problem page with letters that might begin:

“Dear Cathy & Claire, You’ve probably heard this a hundred times before but I’m absolutely crazy about David Cassidy. I’ve felt like this for ages, and, please believe me, it’s NOT just a childish crush….”

(Images: tilleysvintagemagazines.com, russell davies at Flickr.com / CC BY-SA 2.0)