BSM, EP and PP

When the Watch Tower moved from Pittsburgh to Brooklyn in 1909 their long-standing series of tracts Old Theology Quarterly was discontinued. It was replaced by a new monthly series that for a while went under three different names, People’s Pulpit, Everybody’s Paper, and the name that stuck, Bible Students Monthly.

The first title was People’s Pulpit and Volume 1 number 1 covered the opening of the Brooklyn Tabernacle. Soon some were issued as Everybody’s Paper, which rearranged the contents slightly to allow the back page (in whole or in part) to be used to advertise a public lecture – often an overprinted local one (or even scrawled in handwriting in the blank space at times).

Both series were soon being called Bible Students Monthly and this title was added officially. Many of the early issues were released with this masthead as volunteer matter, but not the first one as this was dated material. The frequent reprinting of certain issues, along with a slight re-jigging of minor content, makes the series a bibliographic nightmare; although as shown in the graphic above, the main article remained the same for all three series titles.

By the beginning of 1913 Bible Students Monthly had won out as the title. The series in America ended at the beginning of 1918, when the new series Kingdom News was introduced. However, in other lands, the title continued for longer. A 1921 issue of BSM from London survives. A 1923 issue of People’s Pulpit from Australia survives, which is really curious since the masthead still shows the Brooklyn Tabernacle – which was long gone to the IBSA by this time.

By 1924 the Bible Students Monthly title had been adopted by a British movement that had separated from the IBSA.