The Argosy, Vol. 21

This issue of The Argosy predates the lurid painted covers that would define pulp culture — its presentation is purely typographic, the title set in stately serif capitals above a dateline and the serial fiction within. Published by Frank Leslie in New York, The Argosy was among the earliest American fiction weeklies printed on cheap wood-pulp paper, a format that made story-reading affordable to working-class readers. This issue carries Edina, a novel by Mrs. Henry Wood, author of the sensation bestseller East Lynne. The magazine's stripped-down design reflects its 1870s moment, just before cover illustration transformed pulps into the genre-signaling, image-first objects that would directly seed the adventure, horror, and crime comics of the twentieth century.