The Argosy, Vol. 58

This issue of The Argosy arrives without a painted cover — just clean letterpress typography on white stock, the word ARGOSY set in widely spaced Roman capitals above the date and a table of contents. Frank Munsey had relaunched the magazine in 1882 and converted it to all-fiction format in 1894, the very year of this issue, creating what historians credit as the first modern pulp magazine. Printed on cheap wood-pulp paper and priced for working-class readers, The Argosy carried serials, adventure tales, and genre fiction — including T. W. Speight's mystery serial The Grey Monk seen here — establishing the commercial fiction ecosystem from which science fiction, hardboiled crime, and weird horror would all eventually grow.