Everyone my age and of course those older than me read magazines, and some of the younger generations read magazines.
Webster defines a magazine as : a type of thin book with a paper cover that contains stories, essays, pictures, etc., and that is usually published every week or month.
I guess that just about covers everything I read growing up.. Of course a few of the magazines I "looked" at had articles in them but I didn't read them. I said I did, but actually all I was doing was looking at the pictures.
Comic books were considered magazines. "Superman" was probably at the top of my list. Each month as the new issue came out, I would devour my treasure from front to back including the Q and A section in the middle that seemed to answer all of the same stupid questions. It frustrated me to no end how some of the stupid questions kept reappearing like "How did Superman get to Earth?". Geesh people why are you even reading the comic book if you didn't know THAT answer.
Of course, another important part of the comic book (magazine) was the back cover where you could buy anything from xray glasses, to a hover board, a one-man helicopter, and gag gifts like fake vomit and fake dog doodoo.
Jughead and Archie would show up on occasion in my personal library and although I wouldn't admit it back then, I think I even had an affection for Little Lulu.
My oldest brother, Dave, was a Boy Scout, so he would receive Boy's Life.magazine. I kinda liked it especially the hobbies and projects but the scouting information bored me a little bit.
Another favorite was Popular Mechanics. Wow, now we are talking about projects. I think Dave subscribed to that magazine as well.It probably gave him the foundation for majoring in Engineering in college. He still teaches Engineering classes to this day at the age of 75 at Wright State University in Dayton, Ohio where his name is legend.
The magazine, I think, also had instructions for making a "shock" machine that he used to run experiments with my best friend, "The Jer" and I as he would make us hold on to some metal orange juice cans that he had connected to a transformer. "The Jer" could hold on all the way up to about 110 volts before he would let out a scream.
But the best of all, the stalwart of the literary world was the "Reader's Digest". What a treasure.
From start to finish, it held my interest for years and years. From "Humor in Uniform" to "Amazing Anecdotes". I read every article, every joke, every story..
My Mom submitted two or three stories for publication but they were never accepted. I still have the rough drafts to this day.
As I have written in this blog in the past, her dedication to the written word is what has inspired me to share my thoughts in blogs and even a publication of some short stories about growing up with my best friend..
Sadly, now all my reading is done on my tablet. Gone are the newspapers. Gone are the magazines, gone is the "feel" of having that magazine in my hand.
Kids nowadays won't have a chance to have a rolled-up comic book in their back pocket that they could simply sit up against a tree or lay in the grass on a Summer day and read about super heroes.
It's just another thing of the past that yeah, I guess I do miss.
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