Dita, reading it is far from a challenge for me, 'cos I was in it too in the 60s!! I read about the penfriends-club-magazine idea and joined. Mine was started by a Geordie lady living in Low Fell in the North East. It began 1967 when my son was born and kept going for a few years and oh! how I looked forward to it dropping through the letterbox each month. There were 7 of us to start with and one lady was near enough (Oxford) to have an occasional day out together. She would get the Greenline and, my town being halfway between Oxford and London, I would get on the same coach, arriving in London for an early lunch! Two of the other ladies left and our leader had some trauma in her life; I think a marital breakdown. I offered to take over but the others lost interest by then, so it dwindled off, in the early 70s.
How strange if we had been members of the same group! I never found anyone else who had heard of them. I suppose they were the forerunner of forums.