{{For|Mary Howarth Arden|Mary Arden (judge)}} '''Mary Macfarlane Howarth''' (bapt. 10 March 1858<ref name="birth">''England, Select Births and Christenings, 1538–1975''</ref> – after 1934) was a British journalist and [[newspaper editor]].
She was the editor of the women's section for the ''[[Daily Mail]]'' in the late 1890s.<ref name="wright" /> In November 1903, she was appointed as the first editor of the ''[[Daily Mirror]]'',<ref>Adrian Bingham, ''Gender, Modernity, and the Popular Press in Inter-War Britain'', p.34</ref> then part of the same group.
Although sometimes described as the first female editor on [[Fleet Street]], she was preceded by [[Delariviere Manley]] and [[Rachel Beer]].<ref>Hadley Freeman [https://www.theguardian.com/media/2005/jun/16/sundaytelegraph.pressandpublishing "Ladies of the press"], ''The Guardian'', 16 June 2005</ref> Almost all the staff at the ''Mirror'' were women, proprietor [[Alfred Harmsworth, 1st Viscount Northcliffe|Alfred Harmsworth]] saw it as a paper "for gentlewomen by gentlewomen".<ref name="wright">Jeff Wright, "[https://archive.today/20121223204615/http://www.bjr.org.uk/data/2003/no3_wright The myth in the Mirror]", ''British Journalism Review'', Vol. 14, No. 3, 2003, pages 59-66</ref>
The first issue sold a relatively healthy 276,000 copies,<!-- Mail = 1 million (1896); Times was on about 50,000 around this time. --> but was soon down to 25,000.<ref name="Griffiths">[[Dennis Griffiths]] (ed.) ''The Encyclopedia of the British Press, 1422–1992'', London & Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1992, p.185</ref> Harmsworth lost confidence in his plan for the paper. According to him, "women can't write and don't want to read".<ref name="Carter">{{Cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rWT4AAAAQBAJ&pg=PA73|title=Critical Readings: Media And Gender|first1=Carter|last1=Cynthia|first2=Steiner|last2=Linda|date=December 1, 2003|publisher=McGraw-Hill Education (UK)|via=Google Books}}</ref> 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]]''.<ref name="wright" />
Howarth, apparently only on loan from the ''Mail'', returned to her former job at the ''Mail'' after a week's publication.<ref name="wright" /><ref name="Griffiths"/> 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.<ref name="wright" /><ref name="Carter"/>
Howarth continued to work as a journalist into the 1930s.<ref>{{cite news|last=Howarth|first=Mary |title=When Women Talk |url=https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0003214/19340831/094/0005 |access-date=19 March 2024 |work=Daily News |date=31 August 1934 |location=London |page=5}}</ref>
No other woman was editor-in-chief of the ''Mirror'' for over a century, until [[Alison Phillips]] took up the post in 2018.<ref>{{Cite web | url=https://www.thethinkingwatermill.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/On-newspapers-in-UK-06-08-2020.pdf | title=On newspapers in UK | website=www.thethinkingwatermill.com}}</ref>
==Personal life==
Howarth was born in [[Manchester]], the daughter of John Rowcroft Macfarlane and Harriette Anne Embleton.<ref>''1901 England Census''</ref><ref>''Manchester, England, Marriages and Banns, 1754–1930 (Cathedral)''</ref>
She married civil engineer Osbert Henry Howarth in 1876 in [[Southport]].<ref>{{cite news |title=Marriages. |url=https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0000183/18770103/003/0001 |access-date=19 March 2024 |work=London Evening Standard |date=3 January 1877 |page=1 |url-access=subscription}}</ref><ref> ''England & Wales, Civil Registration Marriage Index, 1837–1915''</ref> They were the parents of writer Osbert John Radcliffe Howarth, who married Eleanor Mary Paget, daughter of [[Stephen Paget]].<ref>{{cite news |title=Howarth-Paget |url=https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0002627/19090515/200/0041 |access-date=19 March 2024 |work=The Queen |date=15 May 1909 |page=41 |url-access=subscription}}</ref> After her first husband's death, she married Rev. George Herbert Nall in June 1909 at [[Westminster Abbey]].<ref>{{cite news |title=Marriages. |url=https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0001290/19090618/089/0005 |access-date=19 March 2024 |work=Bedfordshire Mercury |date=18 June 1909 |page=5 |url-access=subscription}}</ref>
==References== {{Reflist}}
{{s-start}} {{s-media}} {{succession box|title=Editor of the ''[[Daily Mirror]]''|years=November 1903|before=''New position''|after=[[Hamilton Fyfe]]}} {{s-end}}
{{Daily Mirror editors}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Howarth, Mary}} [[Category:1858 births]] [[Category:Date of death missing]] [[Category:Date of birth missing]] [[Category:Year of death missing]] [[Category:Journalists from Manchester]] [[Category:British newspaper editors]] [[Category:Daily Mirror people]]