Shonen/Shojo Club

Also known as 少年クラブ (Shonen Kurabu) and 少女クラブ (Shojo Kurabu)

Shonen Club (September 1953)

Shonen Club was begun by Kodansha in November 1914 as a monthly magazine catering to the interests of elementary/middle school boys. Originally featuring articles, poetry and serialized novels, by the 1930s it began focusing more and more on manga. It was such a success that in 1923 it gained a sister-publication, Shojo Club, which offered similar content, albeit catering to the interests of girls rather than boys.

After the end of World War II, in April 1946 both periodicals changed the Japanese characters in their names for “Club” from “倶楽部” to the more modern-sounding “クラブ” to keep up with the changing times and remained that way until they were both discontinued and merged with Kodansha‘s newer publications Weekly Shonen Magazine and Weekly Shojo Magazine respectively.

During its heyday, Shonen Club featured a long run of some of Tezuka’s important adventure serials, beginning with The Adventure of Rock (1952-54), followed by Chief Detective Kenichi (1954-56), and Whirlwind Z (1957-58), and ending with Donguri March (1959). However, of the two publications, Shojo Club is arguably the more notable, given that it featured both the original version of Princess Knight [Shojo Club] (1953-56) as well as Phoenix [Shojo Club] (1956-57), an early version of what would later become Osamu Tezuka’s life’s work.