I was thrilled to win this bookmark in an eBay auction recently. And honestly, I am amazed I got it for AUD$6.95! So cheap! It's worth so much more.
The bookmark is in incredible condition for its age, almost 'as new', and it promotes two of Australia's iconic magazines, both part of Australia's publishing heritage. Also, the graphics are gorgeous!
The bookmark is in incredible condition for its age, almost 'as new', and it promotes two of Australia's iconic magazines, both part of Australia's publishing heritage. Also, the graphics are gorgeous!
 Bookmark - front - c. 1930s-1940s The front of the bookmark features a Koala, an animal native to Australia and a native Eucalypt Tree. |  Bookmark - back The back of the bookmark features a lady's hand holding a mirror. |
It is difficult to date the bookmark other than it is definitely between 1924 and 1961 (the years The Australian Women's Mirror was published. Another clue is that the bookmark shows the magazine cost 3d (former currency before Australia converted to decimal currency in January 1966). I did some research and found out that the magazine cost 3d in the 1930s and most of the 1940s, so we can assume the bookmark was issued somewhere in that period. After that the magazine rose in price to 4d and later 6d.
Front cover of the Vol. 14 No. 23, 3 May 1938 issue
The Bulletin was an Australian weekly magazine first published in Sydney on 31 January 1880. The publication's focus was politics and business, with some literary content, and editions were often accompanied by cartoons and other illustrations. The views promoted by the magazine varied across different editors and owners, with the publication consequently considered either on the left or right of the political spectrum at various stages in its history. The Bulletin was highly influential in Australian culture and politics until after the First World War, and was then noted for its nationalist, pro-labour, and pro-republic writing.
It was revived as a modern new magazine in the 1960s, and after merging with the Australian edition of Newsweek in 1984 was retitled The Bulletin with Newsweek. It was Australia's longest running magazine publication until the final issue was published in January 2008
The Australian Woman's Mirror was an Australian weekly women's magazine published by The Bulletin magazine in Sydney, between 1924 and 1961. The magazine's contents included the standard recipes, knitting patterns, along with articles about fashion, holiday destinations and household tips. On the literary front it included, on a regular basis, short stories, poems, and serialised novels by such authors as Ethel Turner, Zora Cross, Mabel Forrest, Roderic Quinn, Myra Morris and Kathleen Dalziel, amongst many others. It published a novel by South Australian architect George Soward (1857–1941), entitled The Mirthful Mutineer.
The Australian Woman's Mirror was the first Australian publication to feature the American comic strip The Phantopm (beginning 1 December 1936). The Mirror's publication of the Phantom strip resulted in the character becoming popular in Australia. For many years, rival magazine The Australian Women's Weekly ran Mandrake the Magician contemporaneously. Both strips were the work of cartoonist Lee Falk.
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