Ten Days in a Mad House: How A Female Reporter Achieved What the Men of the Time Could Not
📖 Weekly Book review #4: .... and by doing so raised over $1,000,000.
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Review
How many people could say they love their jobs? How many teachers could say they've slept overnight in their school of employment for the sake of their students? How many officers could say they've gone above and beyond in patrolling to protect their citizens? And how many reporter could say they've intentionally committed themselves in an insane asylum to expose the place and write a book?
Not much I believe, I certainly wouldn't, but this was the case for the 23-year-old reporter Nellie Bly who did just that by appointing herself in a madhouse for ten days to report on the conditions within. What's more, thanks to her writing and sleuthing abilities, Blackwell’s Island Insane Asylum was appointed $1,000,0002 more per year to better the conditions of the suffering fellows within. But first, who even was Nellie Bly? One cannot begin to discuss the significance of Bly's contributions to social affairs without first coming to understand who she was as a person.
Who is Nellie Bly
It is not often I read of an author or reporter so tantalizing that they deserve a separate piece of their own, but Nellie Bly as I'm sure, is the exception to that. Born Elizabeth Jane Cochran, Nellie Bly was the pen name she chose after an African-American character in the song "Nelly Bly"3 by Stephen Foster. Her life as a reporter was illustrious in her articles just as it was successful in pioneering a new field of investigative journalism. From her very beginnings, replying to an article in the news titled "What Girls Are Good For" which argued in the popular belief of the time that women were good only for birthing children and maintaining a home, Nellie Bly was ahead of her time (and arguably our very own time). Disregarding all her social work for women and struggling minorities of all types, Nellie Bly was also a keen lover of adventure whose job as a columnist came into handy with her unique experiments, such as her traveling the world in 72 days beating the fictional character in the book Around the World in Eighty Days (1873), and gaining a lot of recognition in return. If there's one women in history whose name deserves recognition, then it is Nellie Bly, whose efforts have made a huge difference in the lives of those who need it most. What these efforts are, we'll get to the shortly...
Ten Days in a Mad House
I was first introduced to this story from another book reviewed here, in a simple line that loosely opened the world of insanity and how it was perceived in the 19th century. That was enough to hook me in, and just as I had finished one book I started another. Don't you just love it when a book is nested in another and is thereby introduced by prior interest in the original? I sure do, and it was this way that I first read Ten Days in a Mad-House, appropriately during 10 hours.
Nellie Bly begins in a first-person narrative by outlining how she was approached, and the dangerous task at hand. A reporter from the World has a most interesting idea at hand, to send Nellie Bly in an insane asylum where she will assimilate with her mates and take the role of a mad woman. To do this first, precautions must be taken.
From a convincing act in a women's boarding house to an even crazier act in a court, Nellie Bly manages to evade all suspicion until she finally arrives in Blackwell’s Island Insane Asylum. Now here is the crazy part (no pun intended) the more the women acted sane, the more they were thought to be insane.
What was publicly deemed as a safe haven for the mentally ill was in fact a human rat trap that the women found themselves in. As each women is admitted for varying reasons; from a language barrier, illness, and deceit, Nellie Bly tells all through her sensational writing style, side by side with the unfortunates.
Other Short Articles
In the same edition, as is the common pairing in the book, are two more short stories to illustrate both Bly's epic work and life during the 19th century.
First Article
In the first short article, Miscellaneous Sketches, Nellie Bly assumes the role of a maiden in need of work. To achieve this, as was common in the day when sites such as Indeed and Linkedin were evidently nonexistent, she marches to a hiring agency.
Employment for women in such agencies, also being the time, were restricted to housework or governess positions, the only work a young women could find, if lucky. As with her famous case in assuming a role, she feigns the role of seeking employment so readily that soon she is able to reveal the conditions and scams of the agency.
Second Article
In her other story, she also seeks work, unlike before, in the form of a white slave. Unlike what the word implies, a white slave is neither what a slave is thought to be nor indicative of skin colour. It is also not sexual slavery as is the result when searched (and as to my surprise, because though I can comprehend faking insanity, I could not find a way to get around that). A white slave is similar to modern sweatshops where workers, often women and children, who don't have many work options are employed to do long hours for little pay and under hostile conditions. No ventilation when chemicals or used, and no cooling or heating system during the sharpness of winter or the fatigue of summer. It was Nellie Bly Who took the initiative to expose these places and at the same time tell the stories of the poor women who worked there.
Why was Nellie Bly Revolutionary
If you are an observant reader, then you'll notice I used the word "sensational" to describe Ms. Bly's writing. Is this indicative of sex, age, or even social class? No, unlike what Hawthorne meant with his “damned mob of scribbling women.”, Nellie Bly is one of, and still is, the smartest women I've read about.
She used both the times, her gender, and her position as a writer to support the struggling class of people as she so readily demonstrated in Ten Days In a Mad House. Her sensational titles were nothing more than a tool to raise awareness, of which she did, using both Her knowledge of the Public and investigative skills to bridge the gap between the poor and the wealthy. Nellie Bly is not only one of the best reporters, she is the best, paving the way to a whole new method of reporting together. If there is one person whose work I encourage reading, considering this being a writer's platform, then it's this revolutionary reporter from the 19th century, the incredible Nellie Bly.
I am happy to be able to state as a result of my visit to the asylum and the exposures consequent thereon, that the City of New York has appropriated $1,000,000 more per annum than ever before for the care of the insane. So I have at least the satisfaction of knowing that the poor unfortunates will be the better cared for because of my work.
Nellie Bly
https://amzn.to/4exk0Uj
More than $33,000,000 today!
If you want to take a listen:
An inspired and brave woman.
I watched the movie and read the book. Recommended !!