The Tablet
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The progressive international Catholic weekly magazine The Tablet was founded in 1840 by a Quaker convert to Catholicism, Frederick Lucas, just 11 years before the restoration of the Catholic Hierarchy in England and Wales. It is the second oldest surviving weekly journal in Britain after the Spectator (which was founded in 1828). It has an international readership of over 55,000.
For the first 28 years of its life, The Tablet was owned by the Catholic laity. In 1868, Fr (later Cardinal) Herbert Vaughan, who had founded the only British Catholic missionary society, The Mill Hill Missionaries, purchased the journal just before the First Vatican Council that defined papal infallibility. The Tablet then remained in the trusteeship of successive Archbishops of Westminster and Superior Generals of the Mill Hill Missionaries for 67 years. In 1935, Cardinal Hinsley and Mill Hill sold the journal back to a group of Catholic laity.
After the restoration of lay ownership, the first two Tablet editors were Douglas Woodruff, formerly of The Times and for many years assisted by Michael Derrick, and the book publisher Tom Burns (Graham Greene's first publisher). They were followed by John Wilkins who after 22 years in the editorial chair retired at the end of 2003. Catherine Pepinster, formerly executive editor of the Independent on Sunday was appointed as the first ever woman editor at the beginning of 2004.