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#264345 06/25/15 07:24 PM
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Pulitzer
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Pulitzer
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I had thought that some of the things the L&C writers had Lois doing when she went under cover seemed a little bit out there, but here's a real life investigative journalist whose operations make Lois's seem tame...

Joy,
Lynn

Last edited by Lynn S. M.; 06/25/15 07:25 PM.
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Pulitzer
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Impressive.


Morgana

A writer's job is to think of new plots and create characters who stay with you long after the final page has been read. If that mission is accomplished than we have done what we set out to do, which is to entertain and hopefully educate.
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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.

Quote
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

Last edited by LabRat; 06/27/15 12:08 PM.


Athos: If you'd told us what you were doing, we might have been able to plan this properly.
Aramis: Yes, sorry.
Athos: No, no, by all means, let's keep things suicidal.


The Musketeers

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