Formerly
My Weekly Reader, the
Weekly Reader was a weekly newspaper for elementary school children. It was first published by the American Education Press of
Columbus, Ohio, which had been founded in 1902 by Charles Palmer Davis to publish
Current Events, a paper for secondary school children. The first issue appeared on September 21, 1928. The first editor was Martha Fulton, who had been hired that summer by Preston Davis, the major owner of the Press, and Harrison Sayre, who became managing editor. Sayre, also the editor of
World News, a paper for high school students, had been urged to start a paper for grade schools by teachers he had met in June 1928, while on a sales trip in
Indiana. Martha Fulton, who was a friend of Sayre's wife, Mary, and a graduate of Wells College, enjoyed travel and adventure. During
World War I, she had been an
American Red Cross worker in
France. She also had "a remarkable rapport with children and had lively interests in every direction." Fulton wrote all these articles. Her sister Peg was the first artist, though soon replaced by her friend Mary Sherwood Wright. Beginning with the third issue,
Eleanor Johnson, director of elementary schools in
York, Pennsylvania, designed tests for the back page.
My Weekly Reader was an instant success. By December, circulation was 99,000. In 1929, a second edition was started for younger children, and their combined circulation was 376,000. By 1931, there were four editions, with a combined circulation of 1,099,000. The keys to its early success were the timely news articles that had a children's angle, and the Uncle Ben letters describing new inventions and discoveries that excited children's imaginations. For example, the second issue's lead article, "A Village Moves to the South Pole", was about Admiral Byrd's 75-man expedition, their sled dogs, and
Paul Siple, a Boy Scout who was with them. Uncle Ben wrote about planned "Seadromes", floating airports that airplanes could use to hop across the Atlantic. The third issue, published on October 5, 1928, began with "How Mother Nature Prepares for Winter". Uncle Ben described seeing his "first radio television set", even though the paper itself had yet to print even a photograph—illustrations for the
Reader having only been drawings to date. On October 12, he wrote about
Zeppelins, and the first
Reader photographs appeared. They depicted "Mr. and Mrs. Hoover" and "Mr. and Mrs. Smith and Grandchildren". Harrison Sayre, who became president of the American Education Press while remaining managing editor of
My Weekly Reader, gave Martha Fulton the major credit for the newspaper's popularity. In his memoirs, Sayre quoted Gertrude Wolff, another editor who shared an office with Fulton: "As I had had some editorial experience, she at times sought my advice on minor details, but the conception and execution of those first issues were hers alone. With her imagination, enthusiasm, intuitive understanding of a child's world, she sensed what would appeal to her young readers. Her very personal stamp on the new publication distinguished the succeeding issues during her years as editor." As the new editions for upper and lower grades were added, Fulton remained the principal writer, even after her marriage in 1930 (to Clarence L. Sager, a
New York City lawyer) and her moves to New York City and
Old Greenwich, Connecticut. Sayre remembered that Fulton wrote for the papers for twelve years, adding that "men of the composing room...testify that with her square, legible, longhand copy, she never missed a deadline". Other people who were important to the newspaper's early years were Laura E. Zirbes, a reading expert at the Ohio State University laboratory school, and Dr. Charles H. Judd of the University of Chicago, who introduced Sayre to Dr.
William S. Gray, who in turn supplied Fulton with graded vocabulary lists. In 1934, a fifth edition was added for the fifth and sixth grades. The price was twenty cents per semester. Circulation continued to rise, passing two million in 1942. Many people still fondly remember the papers they read as children and how they looked forward to Friday afternoons when their teachers handed out the latest issue. In 1949, the American Education Press was sold to
Wesleyan University and became American Education Publications, a division of the
Wesleyan University Press. Editorial offices were moved to
Middletown, Connecticut, but printing continued to be done in Columbus, Ohio. There were then six editions, one for each elementary grade, with a total circulation of 4,269,000. Total circulation of AEP papers was 5,605,000. In 1965, Wesleyan sold American Education Publications to the
Xerox Corporation to form Xerox Education Press. By then, there was also a kindergarten edition. Eleanor Johnson was editor-in-chief of all editions. which operated the competing
Scholastic News. Scholastic announced that it would be shutting down
Weekly Reader publication and moving some of its staff to
Scholastic News. •
Let’s Find Out / Weekly Reader Pre-K •
Let’s Find Out / Weekly Reader K •
Scholastic News / Weekly Reader Edition 1 •
Scholastic News / Weekly Reader Edition 2 •
Scholastic News / Weekly Reader Edition 3 •
Scholastic News / Weekly Reader Edition 4 •
Scholastic News / Weekly Reader Edition 5/6 ==Polls==