I've always thought the wonderful Nellie Bly must have been one of Lois's role models. She would have been an extraordinary reporter in any age, but to consider what she did and what she achieved whilst fighting against the misogynistic restraints of her time is nothing short of astounding.
Burdened again with theater and arts reporting, Bly left the Pittsburgh Dispatch in 1887 for New York City. Penniless after four months, she talked her way into the offices of Joseph Pulitzer's newspaper, the New York World, and took an undercover assignment for which she agreed to feign insanity to investigate reports of brutality and neglect at the Women's Lunatic Asylum on Blackwell's Island.
After a night of practicing deranged expressions in front of a mirror, she checked into a boardinghouse. She refused to go to bed, telling the boarders that she was afraid of them and that they looked "crazy". They soon decided that she was "crazy", and the next morning summoned the police. Taken to a courtroom, she pretended to have amnesia. The judge concluded she had been drugged.
Several doctors then examined her; all declared her insane. "Positively demented," said one, "I consider it a hopeless case. She needs to be put where someone will take care of her."[13] The head of the insane pavilion at Bellevue Hospital pronounced her "undoubtedly insane". The case of the "pretty crazy girl" attracted media attention: "Who Is This Insane Girl?" asked the New York Sun. The New York Times wrote of the "mysterious waif" with the "wild, hunted look in her eyes" and her desperate cry: "I can't remember I can't remember."[14]
Her expose of asylum conditions was a sensation of its day and proved women could report on more than flower shows, paving the way for generations of female reporters to come.
Of course, as this astonishing admissions board from a Victorian era asylum shows, getting admitted to one wasn't terribly difficult! One can only imagine the misery of the poor victims who languished for years, after these diagnosis! Where novel reading, egotism and - bizarrely - fighting fire were all grounds for incarceration. I think most poignant though is the simple listing - The War.
https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=admission+board,+victorian+asylum&newwindow=1&gws_rd=cr,ssl&ei=A8iOVciwLOTO7gaD3pDwDA#gws_rd=cr,ssl&imgrc=IPbDzc6DC-EnWM%3A
(Apologies for the link - every now and then my ipad refuses to give me a hyperlink option or translate emoticon codes on this forum and today is one of those days. :rollseyes: It also inexplicably decided that typing the emoticon for dizzy meant thumbsup. Bizarrely irksome machine! <g>)
LabRat
