Remembering Nellie Bly

When women’s stories were not deemed newsworthy, Nellie Bly made them sensational.

She was the one who put women on the front page of the biggest newspapers in America — in the 1880s. She was the one with her name in the headline, when most male reporters didn’t even get a byline. She arguably invented investigative journalism, with her undercover exposés on conditions for women in insane asylums, factories, and jails. She was the one who raced the fictional Phileas Fogg around the world — and won. Long before Oprah, she was a gifted interviewer, who got the story from her notable female subjects of the day: Susan B Anthony, Emma Goldman, Belva Lockwood and all the first ladies. When she died, one hundred years ago this year, it was said she was the best reporter in America.

Her given name was Elizabeth, her mother called her Pink, but she was and is best known as Nellie Bly.

Nellie Bly was born Elizabeth Cochran in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on May 5, 1864. Her father died unexpectedly when she was young, leaving his wife, Mary Jane and their daughter, Pink (as she was called due to the frilly clothes her mother dressed her in), to fend for themselves. Mary Jane’s disastrous second marriage to an abusive alcoholic followed; at just fourteen Nellie was taking the stand to testify in their divorce…