Volume 1, Number 1, of the Matilda Ziegler Magazine for the Blind, while not exactly a preview of succeeding issues, gave readers a taste of the variety that would mark future contents. Its 52 pages began with a "Publisher's Announcement" that told the story of the magazine's origin, outlined editorial policy and ended with mild advice: "Mrs. Ziegler says she will feel amply repaid for the outlay of the money if the blind derive one-half the pleasure from reading the magazine that she does in sending it; and she urges readers to make an effort to rise above their affliction; to learn to do something, though ever so small, by which to employ their time; to keep always in a cheerful mood, for thereby they are happier themselves and make their friends and loved ones around them more happy. Each effort made to do something will make you stronger in your next effort for something higher."

There followed letters of commendation from President Theodore Roosevelt and former President Grover Cleveland (who as a young man had worked in a school for the blind in New York). A long letter from Helen Keller to Mrs. Ziegler was included, and she made a plea that the magazine be as nearly as possible like those for the sighted. "We are not children to be written down to, not specialists interested only in blindness. We are human beings of varied intelligence and many interests and aspirations. The new magazine will be a boon to the happiest and most successful of us. To the poorer and less fortunate of us it will be a God send."

The lead article was excerpted from Fighting the Polar Ice, a book by Anthony Fiala, who led the second Ziegler Arctic expedition. The well-loved Fiala, who had so impressed William Ziegler with his leadership qualities, described the hardships of the expedition, and the thorough planning that had made it possible. Strangely enough, this article ended inconclusively, with the explorers still trapped in the Arctic. When it was reprinted in the March 1997 issue, celebrating the magazine's 90th anniversary, many readers wanted to know the rest of the story, and an account of the rescue of the explorers made up the "Editor's Line" in the July 1997 issue.

The second article in March 1907, "A Good Physical Exercise" gave instructions for simple exercises that blind people could perform either outdoors or in the home in order to keep fit.

Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch, the initial installment of a bittersweet novel by Alice Caldwell Hegan, took up the next 11 pages. There followed two pages of jokes and six pages of "Current Events." Among these were reports of a train wreck that killed 30 people and injured many more—mostly Mexican laborers, an earthquake in Jamaica, a California lawsuit over free education for children of Japanese immigrants, and the seventh national exhibition of the Automobile Association, which "presents one of the most remarkable sights in the history of mankind. There you may see a collection of machinery so wonderful in its performance, as well as in its possibilities, that a mere recital of them sounds like a tale of fairyland." Among the wonder of the automobile would be the ability to travel form New York to San Francisco "with no aid but a few gallons of coal essence and a little water."

Esperanto had just been promulgated at an international conference, and the magazine gave the text of the Esperanto Hymn of Peace. A short story took up the next five pages, followed by the Ella Wheeler Wilcox poem, "This, Too, Shall Pass Away." After a miscellany called "Some Interesting Facts" (fair-haired people have more hairs than brunettes; a watch's balance spring vibrates 18,000 times an hour), the magazine ended with an embossed image of the United States flag with a poem, "Your Flag and My Flag." The back cover featured an annotated embossed map of the Caribbean area.