Mary Howarth

Who is Mary Howarth?

Mary Howarth was a British newspaper editor.

Howarth edited the women's column in the Daily Mail in the late 1890s. In November 1903, she was appointed as the first editor of the Daily Mirror.

Although sometimes described as the first female editor on Fleet Street, she was preceded by Rachel Beer and Delariviere Manley. Almost all the staff at the Mirror were women, proprietor Alfred Harmsworth describing it as a paper "for gentlewomen by gentlewomen".

The first issue sold a healthy 276,000 copies, but the second sold 143,000 and Harmsworth lost confidence in his plan for the paper. He wrote to Hamilton Fyfe to offer him the job of editor. Fyfe replied, confirming that he would be happy to take up the post, as soon as he could resign as editor of the Morning Advertiser.

By the end of the first week, sales were down to 100,000 copies, and Howarth returned to her job at the Mail. Fyfe took up the editorial post early in 1904, sacking almost all the female staff. He relaunched the paper with a focus on printing photographs of events.