Who was Nellie Bly?

Nellie Bly, formerly known as Elizabeth Cochran

Famous muckraking journalist Nellie Bly was originally born Elizabeth Cochran on May 5, 1864 in Cochran’s Mills, Pennsylvania.¹ Elizabeth’s father, Judge Michael Cochran, founded the Pennsylvania town while working as a mill owner, and served as a judge within the community.² His unexpected death when Elizabeth was six resulted in the dividing of his monetary fortune between his numerous children,³ ultimately reducing the family from a lifestyle of comfort to one near poverty.

At the age of 15, Elizabeth chose to enroll in the State Normal School in Indiana, Pennsylvania, adding an “‘e’ to her last name to sound more distinguished.”⁴ Elizabeth intended to graduate and work as a teacher in order to support herself, however the money Judge Cochran had left his daughter quickly ran out, and following only a year and a half of formal education, Elizabeth was forced to move home to Pittsburgh and her mother’s boarding house.⁵

With very little formal education, and no experience in journalism, Elizabeth’s rise to prominence was unexpected. However, her dedication to reform and feminine critique of class and gender roles ultimately led her to great success. An 1885 article published in the Pittsburgh Dispatch claiming a woman’s place was as a helpmate to men in the home, prompted an angry letter penned by Elizabeth to the Dispatch’s editor George A. Madden.⁶ Signed “Lonely Orphan Girl,”⁷ Elizabeth concealed her identity from the newspaper, until editor Madden, impressed with the writing, requested for the author of the angry letter to reveal herself. Elizabeth’s decision to “[march] into the Dispatch offices and [introduce] herself,”⁸ resulted in the editor promptly offering her a job as a columnist. With the beginnings of her journalistic career, Elizabeth decidedly changed her “pseudonym from ‘Lonely Orphan Girl’ to ‘Nellie Bly,’ after a popular song.”⁹ Therefore, this exhibit will now address Elizabeth formally as Nellie Bly.

As the New York World later stated on March 23, 1895, Nellie Bly was described as “tall and slender, with a very interesting and intelligent face. Her eyes are brown, her hair almost black. Her hands seem almost too small to hold a pen. She writes, however, very rapidly.”¹⁰ Evident from the beginning, Nellie Bly’s feminine appearance served as a great asset to her journalistic endeavors, and was repeatedly referenced throughout her career. Although, rather than hiding her femininity to depict conventional stories, Nellie Bly utilized her femininity as a means of reform, as well as offering a feminist voice that transgressed gender and class lines.