Christian Herald, 1935 and 1960–2; and Sunday Companion, 1955

We came across some evangelical newspapers the other day, mainly from the 1950s and 1960s. They consist mostly of the Christian Herald (a single copy for 1935, otherwise about sixty copies for 1960–2); and the Sunday Companion (about twenty copies for 1955).

 These were published on newsprint but are in remarkably good condition. Both are all black and white apart from the use of an extra colour on the outside covers.

 The Christian Herald is a weekly, and started around 1866, and thus predates the American newspaper with the same name. By the 1960s it cost 4d and had absorbed Radiant Youth and Signs of our Times. I can’t find anything about the former, but with Radiant Youth there is an American magazine of the same name although I don’t think it’s the same as this one. With the strapline  ‘A topical weekly illustrated for all ages’, the Christian Herald appears to have a wide appeal to bring in Christian readers of all persuasions. Typical content includes, for example, the Rev B.L. Simpson’s explanation of how ‘eternal truth may be present fact’; short stories; guidance on ‘courting’; a Q&A with Billy Graham; topical news round up; a children’s pull-out insert; bible study; book reviews; ‘Women’s World’ (recipes, mostly); and letters to the editor. As far as I can tell, the UK version ceased publication in 2006.

 The Sunday Companion appealed to an equally broad audience. Another weekly, starting I think in the 1890s, it cost 3d for our 1955 copies. It had absorbed Sunday Stories and Horner’s Stories (both around 1940 as far as I can tell). Typical content of the Sunday Companion is short stories, reports on missions, comment, puzzles and a cartoon. The title is no longer published and I don’t know when it succumbed.

 The ads in both are interesting, and if there is a theme, they tend to be for ailments. The early copy has ads for fixing your rheumatism, asthma, along with Elasto tablets (‘not a drug, but a vital cell-food’); and Anti-Bi-San (‘guaranteed to prevent influenza’). Laxative tablets and elastic trusses can be found in here, plus hearing aids and ‘matron’s corsets’, along with Ovaltine, Bovril and Barnado’s Homes. By 1960 little had changed – still for ailments, but with more ads for charities (Homes for Motherless Children, Royal London Society for the Blind, John Groom’s Crippleage, Spurgeon’s Homes).

 Both have a high editorial-to-ad ratio. Another detail I spotted is the coverage of (and contributions by) the evangelist preacher Billy Graham (1918–2018), quite a pin up at the time. He was on his first UK tour in 1960 and features widely in the Christian Herald.