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83 – Nelly Bly
51 Plays2 months ago
On this week’s show, Jeff shares the story of Nellie Bly, born Elizabeth Jane Cochran in 1864, a pioneering American journalist whose fearless investigative reporting helped define modern journalism.
Bly gained national attention in 1887 after faking mental illness to be committed to the Women’s Lunatic Asylum on Blackwell’s Island in New York City. Her undercover reporting exposed brutal conditions and widespread abuse inside the asylum, leading to public outrage and significant reforms in mental health care.
In 1889, Nellie Bly became the first woman to travel around the world, completing the journey in just 72 days. Her courage, innovation, and determination shattered expectations and opened the door for generations of investigative journalists to follow.
Trigger Warning:
Discussion of mental illness, institutional abuse, and historical mistreatment of patients.
Visit us on Linktree for the collection of links, Instagram, or email us at jeffandsamshow@gmail.com
Sources:
- National Women’s History Museum – Nellie Bly Biography
https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/nellie-bly-0 - Library of Congress – Nellie Bly and Blackwell’s Island
https://blogs.loc.gov/headlinesandheroes/2022/11/nellie-bly-blackwells-island/ - Soflete – Nellie Bly
https://soflete.com/blogs/die-living/nellie-bly - Encyclopaedia Britannica – Nellie Bly
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Nellie-Bly - Ten Days in a Mad-House – University of Pennsylvania Digital Library
https://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/bly/madhouse/madhouse.html - Google Search – How did Nellie Bly get committed?
https://www.google.com/search?q=how+did+nellie+bly+get+committed
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Transcript
00:00:00
Jeff Rogers
Okay. Hello, Sam. Hi, Jeff.
00:00:24
Jeff Rogers
Samantha. again Do it again. With my pen. Welcome to the Jeff and Sam show. I'm Jeff. And I'm Sam. Did we do that last time?
00:00:36
Jeff Rogers
I hope we did't if we did. i don't know. We're not professional. I can't remember an hour ago. <unk> um Welcome to the show. if You can find us on Instagram. Email us if you want. Everything is in the show notes. Rate, review, subscribe. Leave us a few stars. Here's the thing. if we're We're not professional people. At all. Okay? And if you tune into this show, if there's a new listener that is perhaps listening to this for the first time and I don't know, like, they're wondering what the fuck are we listening to? It's just us. So, typically, typically, if you listen to us on a Thursday,
00:01:12
Jeff Rogers
It's like a anywhere from like 10 to 20 to 30 minutes of rambling of me and Jeff just, I'm too close to my microphone. Hold on. This is too much. That, of that stuff exactly right there. it' me That's who we are.
00:01:27
Jeff Rogers
Wait, my thing went down. Hold your thing. Oh no. You're fighting. Sam is fighting with the microphone stand. Okay, hold on. No, but that went down.
00:01:38
Jeff Rogers
Should I pause this? No, we're good. That's the Jeff and Sam show right there. We're good. We're good. Can you hear me? Yeah, i can hear you You can hear me. I can. Okay.
00:01:49
Jeff Rogers
Okay. So, uh... So you were saying it's 20 minutes of us just babbling. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. so So, the point is, is that it's the opening to the show is, um, us just shooting the shit and talking and, uh, some people like that part of it. Some people think we should just tell the story. and those people are absolutely wrong. Absolutely. The first people are definitely right. I'm okay. I'm good there. Um, so, but anyways, it's just listen to us, put up with us or fast forward through the first little bits. Um,
00:02:25
Jeff Rogers
the second part of the show on and a normal day is Jeff or I, we will will flip a coin um and then one of us will tell a story to get an hour later. We're both done telling stories that are completely unrelated and completely random. We don't talk to each other about what we're going to say during the shift.
00:02:47
Jeff Rogers
Shifts.
00:02:49
Jeff Rogers
During the show. um But ah sometimes we will give you just a onesie twosie, right? So, Last week's episode was just Jeff telling a story after we chatted and caught up. um It was a horrible, amazing, awful, fan-fucking-tastic story that only Jeff could tell with such...
00:03:13
Jeff Rogers
Well, here's the thing. To give credit where credit is due, the articles that I read, the the writers that i used and cited at the end, those are the people that are doing like the beautiful work, right? Yeah. And I'm using their words to tell the story.
00:03:30
Jeff Rogers
And that's what I have come to appreciate, like those journalists that... that do the work and write the hard stories yeah and that's why i'm gonna start before i tell the story from now on start like citing the people that i use because like the national endowment for the humanities that fucking article was but it was on the tulsa race massacre last week that article was brilliant and those men or men and women i don't know but uh anyway we get off track we digress Never. We don't. We don't do that. That's not part of the story. Normally, that's not part of the show.
00:04:03
Jeff Rogers
The story of us. We're always right on Right on it. So this week, again, as Jeff mentioned, if you if you are a new listener, welcome to 2026. Welcome to the Jeff and Sam show. um we are a mess. We are a vortex of fuckery. We are the hall of flame. Yeah. And sometimes you will hear Jeff say random things like here's the deal. And when he says that, he means here's the deal. Deal. So. that You know, and it's so funny. I never knew I said words. I don't even care. It's fine. But you know what? I wouldn't have it any other way. don't even care.
00:04:37
Jeff Rogers
We tell very different stories sometimes. Sometimes we don't say that. don't like that at all. Stop. Here's the Nope. Say whale. Whale. Nope. well Whale. Whale.
00:04:49
Jeff Rogers
Will. Will. Will. Have heard about the well that washed up on the shore? That's phenomenal. That's one of my favorites. Forever and all time. It's forever and all time.
00:05:03
Jeff Rogers
Have you heard of the well that washed up on the shore? I
00:05:09
Jeff Rogers
trying to figure out how I fucking well washed up on the shore. youw I come back out and Jeff's like, yeah, there's well particles flying through the air. to I'm like, fucking rocks? Are these people okay?
00:05:22
Jeff Rogers
You can take the boy out of Alabama, but can't take Alabama out of the boy can't at all. End of story. so that's us. that's Yeah, yeah. so that's This is Yavis. This is Yavis. This is the show.
00:05:37
Jeff Rogers
This is the Jeff and Sam show. We put random accents, random me, not so much because I don't know any other languages, but Jeff knows a bunch. So he'll like, I know a bunch of words, throw a bunch of other words from other languages. And, um, yeah, ob beast.
00:05:53
Jeff Rogers
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's like, yeah, well. Oh. Yeah, okay. Helveta. Oh, helveta. Helveta. No, i see, I still don't say it the same way. Say it. don't know. So that's one of those words. Helveta.
00:06:06
Jeff Rogers
There's in a Norwegian that understands me right now. Helveta. Helveta. Nope, can't do it. so tried to roll the day at work. When I'm with a bunch of Norwegian people, and they're just randomly talking, I'll say something like, yeah, and you know the other helvete. And they're like, did he just say, what?
00:06:26
Jeff Rogers
Just a random cuss word Norwegian. Didn't do that with Ger? You did. You me do it. And he just did. He second went...
00:06:35
Jeff Rogers
Is this little white girl saying that? Love those Norwegians. um Yes. Yes. Okay. So, okay. January 15th. This is when you're hearing us. um Right now, future Jeff and Sam, because we're we're from the past right now. But when you're listening to this. On the 15th at 1800, you and I will be six hours into a flight. Ten hour we're flight.
00:06:59
Jeff Rogers
two Cairo. Cairo. Egypt. Where, if anyone is wondering, my pagan ass, who appreciates but does not celebrate the occult, will not be summoning any mummies I will not be reading from any death books. I will not be opening any death chests.
00:07:24
Jeff Rogers
If that happens, blame Jeff because I will not be doing it. I appreciate the occult. I can look at it from a distance, but I will not participate. Sam's going to accidentally. I'm pagan witch and I support that fully. That is different. That is different from the occult. Don't you it. You're going accidentally open some shit. Nope. No, I won't. No, I won't. You're going to trip and fall. fuck. unlatch the box that unleashes the souls of thousands of don't know whatever y'all it's gonna i'm going home and watching the mummy tonight and i'm gonna watch it every single night between now and when we leave she's gonna trip and fall kick something it's gonna rattle this shake that okay so we are saying this now on oh my god spirits are gonna come flying out on the 8th of january before we leave for egypt
00:08:11
Jeff Rogers
Jeff has sent me a video, which is apparently the one flaw in the brand new, beautiful, magical, majestic, fan-fucking-tastic museum that Egypt in Cairo, they have built. This new museum that is fucking great, right?
00:08:28
Jeff Rogers
Apparently there is one flaw. They have a pool, puddle, water place. Yeah, it's like a um it's like the reflective pool.
00:08:39
Jeff Rogers
Yeah, okay. But it's built around a statue, so it's very small, square. But also it's not very obvious that it is in fact a pool. so It was a true flaw. All these videos are of these people who like take that step, and you know when you miss a step and you kind of like, huh catch yourself, right? Well, all of these people so far in the video have stepped into the water and caught themselves.
00:09:04
Jeff Rogers
Part of me and maybe most of Jeff thinks that if this is to, no, actually, no, not. We all think that I will accidentally step in this pool, even though I know it's a happen, like a thing that could happen. But hopefully now they've got it kind of blocked because maybe i think that was something they weren't thinking about because it's very beautiful. Okay. But they weren't thinking people would mistake it for a shiny floor, which is what's happening. So they're mistaking the lovely reflective pool for a shiny floor and they're walking onto it. and Then they realize it's like a foot of water. Okay. So just for clarification, he's hoping that that has changed. I, with all of my being, hope that they have fixed that because –
00:09:47
Jeff Rogers
If they have not, it will not be a graceful, accidental step, catch myself, oh, I'm good. It will be a full-on- Portal to the gates of hell, opening up. Step and face plant through the portal into- the hell mouth will open.
00:10:06
Jeff Rogers
Into Nipfelheim. Fake. I'm out. I'm gone. Where'd Sam go? She got lost. If there's a rumble in Cairo on the 16th. It's me. Or 17th or 18th.
00:10:18
Jeff Rogers
I'm so sorry. Honestly, guys, it's me. I woke the spirits against my will and against my wishes. She didn't mean to. didn't. you think we can tell the spirits, hey, we didn't mean to do that. It was purely accidental. That's what I do every time I wake them. Every time I say, listen, my bad, my bad, my bad. I accidentally did this thing. It didn't mean to. They believe Can you all go back?
00:10:39
Jeff Rogers
Oh my God, Ashley and I, um, just read a book and it's a book I've had for a while, but I hadn't read it. It's called the winter people. um you would love this book. Super dark spirits.
00:10:55
Jeff Rogers
um So say no mar like this woman is living in present day Vermont in a house that was built a long time ago in the early nineteen hundred maybe in the 1800s. There was a death in this house in like 1908. The lady in current times finds a journal under the floor from one of the people from a hundred years earlier. I may not have read this, but want to read it again.
00:11:19
Jeff Rogers
ah Super creepy, super dark. Love it. ah Everything we were just talking about, like it's all about grief and the depths that you go to in grief, maybe to bring, in this case, to bring somebody back and opening up that.
00:11:36
Jeff Rogers
Yeah. Bringing people back from death. No, see, that's not what I'm about. Well, this book is super fantastic. Love the book and I don't have it on me. to people The winter people. The winter people. Yeah. it's It's good. It's good. Okay. I think you'll like it. maybe Maybe that's one for the plane.
00:11:55
Jeff Rogers
One for the plane. Oh, I got to carry a book for the plane. You do? You know, there's nothing on earth that makes me fall asleep faster than reading a book on a plane. I look like, I don't know.
00:12:06
Jeff Rogers
what did I look like? I could not keep my head up on a two-hour flight that we took. I was trying to read Stephen King, and I was just like... which which which which no it was joe hill which wait which one were you reading which wait with the revival by stephen king yeah i was reading the revival by stephen king on a flight from huntsville alabama to dc honestly and i literally would read a paragraph and fall asleep he was he was doing the head bob so hard it was hard what was bob mouth open head bobs it was good
00:12:41
Jeff Rogers
My goal, it would be ideal because we arrive at 5 a.m. m I would like to sleep over overnight during the flight. However, if I don't, I intend to finish watching Peaky Blinders.
00:12:57
Jeff Rogers
Oh, are you into it? Am I into it? Am I into I'm sorry. For all of those listening, you listeners, you people, some of you who know me, some of you don't. If you don't know me, then welcome to me. Are you fucking kidding? Do I like the gangster? That was rhetorical. That was rhetorical. Irish, England mobster. Like, yeah. Are you fucking kidding?
00:13:23
Jeff Rogers
Peaky blinders. Yeah, no. I can't believe I've waited so long to watch it. But I think that I know that I waited for a reason and I don't remember the reason right now.
00:13:35
Jeff Rogers
Don't you think Killian Murphy is so hot? Killian Murphy is such a beautiful little man. he's not hot. I would not say hot. would say hot. you You could say that. I don't know. Gorgeous. yeah I would say. he's pretty. He's a very pretty person. He's got a very lovely bone structure. He's got unbelievable eyes. They are just stunning.
00:13:56
Jeff Rogers
But hot is not a thing that I would say about him. ah However, if anyone were to ever rock... that look besides our man dan by the way because daniel you rock the the what's that hat called oh i don't know we bought him one from london we did what the fuck was it called the hat that they wear in pinky blinders let me let me look it up yeah i would like to know i think i have to look it up every time the hat what's it called um it's not a and no i got nothing uh alan wears one too
00:14:29
Jeff Rogers
Oh, I can see him wearing one. You did London. Did see wearing one? He also can wear it then. Because when you can wear it and wear it, what's it called? It says in Peaky Blinders, the characters primarily wear an eight panel newsboy cap or Baker boy caps.
00:14:46
Jeff Rogers
I would like you to find another answer to that. ah That's it. Baker boys. Baker boy hat? Okay. I don't like the name, but listen. if They're often called flat caps.
00:14:59
Jeff Rogers
Flat caps. We'll text Daniel after this. but um Yeah, that hat. You're into the show. Yes. I am into it. I hate so many moments of it, but also, Aunt Paul, let me tell you, if I'm going to be anyone, it's going to be Aunt Paul.
00:15:19
Jeff Rogers
It's going to be either Aunt Paul or Tommy because i i ain't no fucking arthur bitch and i ain't no fucking listen i'm tommy and i'm aunt paul i'm both of them yeah that's such a good show say i'm not honestly i can't remember who those characters are because it's been years since i've watched it but i know i need to re-watch it because tommy is killian murphy yes cunning who's his hot brother you The one that you showed me the picture of. The blonde.
00:15:50
Jeff Rogers
Don't say. So it's Arthur, Tommy, John. No, john not John. Johnny. Yeah, John. Maybe not. And then Finn. Finn is the youngest. Yes. But the blonde, that I think it's John.
00:16:06
Jeff Rogers
Oh, that's so pretty. You're welcome. Alan, we're using, Ashley, we're using the um round hourglass mountain Sand place.
00:16:18
Jeff Rogers
um Attention deficit disorder, line one. Who, you? Not me. Mm-hmm. Whatever. Anyway, that's it, yeah? So we're in Cairo right now.
00:16:32
Jeff Rogers
I'm going to tell you a story that has absolutely nothing to do with Cairo.
00:16:37
Jeff Rogers
Wait, wait. we there yet? You're telling us the story? Am I? Did we miss something? I don't think so. This is the show, people. This is all we got. This is professional as we can be. What are you drinking?
00:16:51
Jeff Rogers
poppy soda. Same. Root beer for me. Let's do our cheers, queers. And then that will free you up to tell the story. Cheers, I can't wait to hear your story. Okay.
00:17:05
Jeff Rogers
So... What's it about? Elizabeth Mary Jane Cochran was born May 5th, 1864, outside Pittsburgh in Cochran's Mill, Pennsylvania.
00:17:20
Jeff Rogers
She was the daughter of successful Michael Cochran, who owned, you guessed it, A mill. Cause you know, Cochran's mill, right? Okay. Did you get there? Were you there? No, you didn't get that. never heard it smell No. Okay.
00:17:35
Jeff Rogers
Anyway, he was an associate of the Armstrong County. Her father had 10, 10, this many children from a previous marriage.
00:17:47
Jeff Rogers
Sorry. Uh, Elizabeth was one of five that were born to Mary Jane Kennedy. Michael had worked hard and risen from a mill worker to an owner.
00:17:58
Jeff Rogers
That's kind of a big deal, right? Like in the late 1800s, he like made his thing, right? So with his impressive reputation, he was elected as a local judge of the town that he founded. So he was a mill worker. right And then he was going to go over here and I'm gonna make this place and it's going to be Cochran's Mill.
00:18:19
Jeff Rogers
My mill, my town. And he made the whole town. So then he was an elected local judge. That's insane. didn't just make himself. They elected him. Exactly. They elected him. So in 1870, when her father died suddenly and unexpectedly, he left no will or plan for the family after his death. And this 15 children and a wife. Okay. 15. Oh, no. 15 children. Yeah.
00:18:44
Jeff Rogers
His considerable wealth was divided between all of those children. Her mother could not maintain the land or the home with the little piece of his fortune that she was provided.
00:18:55
Jeff Rogers
So... She and her children were forced to leave Cochran's Mill. Her mother remarried, but it was short-lived, because of abuse, which is awesome for her because she had the the wherewithal to leave, right? Like, this is 1870s, 18, right? And she was like, no, I'm getting abused. I'm leaving. I'm done. She didn't just stick with it. So in 1878, the divorce was finalized. Elizabeth, who was at the time 15 years old, enrolled in the state normal school which I don't know what that means. That sounds so like bad. I'm in the state normal school. Right. Like I don't know what's happening here but I don't know why it's called the normal school. i'm I'm not less than normal. Not above normal. and not I'm just in the normal school. I'm just normal. We're in the normal school. So that was in Indiana, Pennsylvania. Did you know such a place existed? Like I know that we have a lot of randomly named places here but
00:19:54
Jeff Rogers
Indiana, Pennsylvania. No. Yeah. So we don't live that far from Pennsylvania. No. I had no idea there was such a place called Indiana. Oh, it would close to Indiana, Pennsylvania? Fuck, if I know, I didn't look.
00:20:06
Jeff Rogers
You should look. We should look. Hold on. Let's find out. Indiana, Pennsylvania. Jeff, how far do you think it is from us? um Three hours. Three hours. in Indiana. Nope.
00:20:19
Jeff Rogers
We're three hours from Philadelphia. i think. Oh, fuck me. It still exists. It is four hours away. It's a real place. Still? Yeah.
00:20:30
Jeff Rogers
Wow. It is. is the Cochran Mill still a thing? Fuck if I know. But they have a country club in Indiana. Indiana, Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania.
00:20:44
Jeff Rogers
Where is this place? Pittsburgh. So ah a wee bit east and north. That's crazy. no Look at that. That place still exists. Okay, anyway. So they're in the Elizabeth, 15 years old, state normal school, Indiana, Pennsylvania.
00:21:05
Jeff Rogers
Fucking stupid. Very confusing. wonder what their mascot was. Okay.
00:21:10
Jeff Rogers
No idea. But this was the time where Elizabeth was like, you know what? Let me add an E to the end of Cochran. Because at this point it was C O C H R A N just Cochran. Right now she's going to be Cochran with an E and go to the above normal school because it seemed more sophisticated. So she did that.
00:21:35
Jeff Rogers
Unfortunately, the family had significant financial struggles that, uh, Now, Elizabeth was forced to withdraw after only one term at the normal school, which can't be that bad, right? It's a normal school, did just withdrawal.
00:21:48
Jeff Rogers
So she and her mother moved back to, or she and her mother moved to Pittsburgh, where her two older brothers were. She started assisting her mother in in the running of a boarding house. okay Elizabeth sought ways to help the family, but her job opportunities, even though she was more educated than her siblings, were extremely limited because...
00:22:12
Jeff Rogers
woman She was a woman. And it's you know it's late 1800s. So she's in Pittsburgh. She reads an article from the Pittsburgh Dispatch, which is a newspaper, criticizing the presence of women in the workforce.
00:22:29
Jeff Rogers
Elizabeth gets inspired to write a letter to the editor seeking more opportunities for women to work as ways to help the financial burden on some of the family is surrounding her because she understands that she's been having a hard time her mom's been having a hard time well why is it such a burden that the women are in the workplace like we need work too we need to be able to pay so as a teenager she began writing to the paper in regular installments under the pseudonym the quote lonely orphan girl which by the way she's not an orphan okay so this is someone that she just made up
00:23:06
Jeff Rogers
She discussed topics that were far beyond her years, including arguing for reform of divorce laws. She's 15 years old. Okay. 15. That's insane.
00:23:18
Jeff Rogers
Under the name, the little girl. The pseudonym, the lonely orphan girl. Oh. Okay. Okay. So the editor was intrigued by this writing that he kept getting. He published a note to the lonely orphan girl asking her to reveal herself. He's like, listen, these responses are great. These letters are great. Let's like, I want to know who you are.
00:23:40
Jeff Rogers
So she marched right into the office of the dispatch and the editor offered her a position working there as a reporter. i
00:23:49
Jeff Rogers
think I have an idea. do yeah Who you are talking about. Do yeah I think. I think my next sentence might clarify that for you.
00:24:02
Jeff Rogers
you want to guess? Is there a um psychiatric facility in the future? you want to guess? Give your name. Is it um Ida? Ida. not No. um You know who it is. Yes. I told you that we know of this woman. And I've been sitting here the whole time waiting on to find out who the, because it wasn't Ring in a Bell, but now it's Ring in a Bell, Nellie Bly. Yes. Is it really? What? so, at this time, under his direction, the editor of the dispatch, she adopted the pen name Nellie Bly, Mic drop. You got it. knew it. Her pieces were focused on the inequalities for women in the Pittsburgh areas. She suggested to her editor that she do a piece on the lives of Pittsburgh's factory girls.
00:24:57
Jeff Rogers
He agreed. And so she went. She went undercover in the factory to experience the poor working conditions firsthand. She took note of the unsafe conditions, the absolute fuck all shit wages, and the long hours that these females, the girls, worked. Her article was published and she did not hold a fucking thing back.
00:25:22
Jeff Rogers
It sparked a lot of interest, but unfortunately it also pissed off a lot of the factory owners and managers. After they persistently complained to the paper and started pulling their funding, her boss decided to change her writing options. He reassigned her to the women's pages. no Which that would be like assigning me to l D, okay? So it covered fashion and gardening and society.
00:25:54
Jeff Rogers
Cause what else does a woman want to talk about than those things? Is parties and celebrations. So she became a successful and well-liked columnist, but was she was dissatisfied with the limits placed on her by the male-dominated workforce. She had more to do. She wanted to write more than just pieces addressing women and their specific homemaker struggles, right? Like, what the fuck?
00:26:21
Jeff Rogers
She didn't care who was getting married. She didn't care about the weddings. So in an insanely ballsy move, Nellie Bly picked up and said, I'm going to Mexico to work as a foreign correspondent.
00:26:34
Jeff Rogers
This is the early nineteen hundreds She is a woman. She's a child. She's 21 years old, okay? She says, I'm out. I'm going to go do this thing.
00:26:45
Jeff Rogers
I'll be back eventually. So she's insec she's in Mexico for six months. She returns, she does some crazy shit out there. Yeah, it's something else to be talked about. This is a different type of or talk.
00:26:58
Jeff Rogers
So she's out there, she does the thing, she does the thing. So then she comes back six months later, she returns to the dispatch and she's like, yeah, I've done this thing. I have proven myself. Let me get my old, like, let me get a job where I can feel like I'm doing something, okay?
00:27:14
Jeff Rogers
What do you think the mail editor does? um something misogynistic he says no no no honey you're gonna go right back to women's fashion right back to social events and that kind of thing and she says fuck all the way off yeah okay quits she quits In 1886, 22-year-old Nellie Bly finds her way to New York to find a newspaper that was more willing to hear her thoughts. Okay?
00:27:46
Jeff Rogers
However, the reporting world in the big city was even more difficult for women than she had realized. Elizabeth is no Nellie Bly. She takes the name, she adopts it as a writer, and she owns it. She keeps it with her as she goes, okay? Okay.
00:28:01
Jeff Rogers
So after a year of fighting tooth and nail to get somewhere, she storms into the office of the New York World, which is the leading newspaper in the country at the time, and demands acknowledgement.
00:28:14
Jeff Rogers
She wanted to write about the immigrant experience in the United States. The editor, a man named Stephen Pulitzer. Really?
00:28:26
Jeff Rogers
Really? Yeah. Says, no, no. no i don't want to hear about that. I don't care. don't give fuck. He goes, I want to know about this mysterious Blackwell's Island insane asylum.
00:28:45
Jeff Rogers
So she said, all right, let's do it. Let's fucking do it. Let's do it all the way. Just so you know, you beat me to this story.
00:28:56
Jeff Rogers
and this you know, i love a badass woman. And she is one of the badassiest of all badass women. And it was on my shortlist on my phone. Have you read?
00:29:08
Jeff Rogers
No, but I know about it. Okay. Yeah. I have. I have i i'm printed out her book. Okay. I will give it to you so you can read it because i couldn't put it all in here because the book, holy fucktards. This is amazing, Jeff. Yeah. Like it's about to just, have you ever seen Stonehurst Asylum?
00:29:28
Jeff Rogers
No. oh Oh, fuck. Watch it tonight. Tonight, tonight, tonight, tonight, tonight. Okay. So Stonehurst Asylum is based on an Edgar Allen Poe story. However,
00:29:40
Jeff Rogers
This whole story just stone hurts me. Okay, the whole thing really gets it. yeah And it, whoa, okay, so read it. I mean, Ben Kingsley is in it, Kate Beckinsale, first of all, Kate Beckinsale. Mm, yum. Just other really important people, but I don't care about them. But watch it tonight. okay So Bly decides to go undercover, get the most in-depth look that she can.
00:30:06
Jeff Rogers
And after reading more and more about her, like you can kind of picture her smile as she says, yeah, let's do it. But you and I first heard about Nellie Bly when?
00:30:21
Jeff Rogers
i don't I don't know. When we were at the My Favorite Murder show, they were telling about some of their sources for this story that It wasn't the, um
00:30:38
Jeff Rogers
I want to say it it was the- um George's was the Stanley Hotel. It wasn't the Stanley. It was, what was the other one we heard about? It was really good. Oh yeah. Karen did the story about- um What's your name?
00:30:52
Jeff Rogers
i can't remember. And brought up Nellie Bly. And that's where I kind of started digging into Nellie Bly. yeah Like this came out and was hot fucking dog. No, she, yeah. Yeah, so this is Nellie Bly, yeah?
00:31:04
Jeff Rogers
So,
00:31:05
Jeff Rogers
she says, yes, Mr. Pulitzer, I will go to the to the facility. I will fake a mental illness to get admitted admitted to the island. um and Pulitzer and the managing editor, Colonel John A. Cockerell,
00:31:18
Jeff Rogers
Stupid name. Sorry. But you're still alive. They said, go in. We promise we will get you out. Okay. We will get you out.
00:31:29
Jeff Rogers
What if they couldn't? I mean, there's so many what ifs to that. You know what I mean? like She went in. First of all, your balls. We promise we're going to get you out. Right. Like from this very notorious, very mysterious site. It's an island. It's a fucking island. It's not even like ah a facility like down the way. It's you have to take a boat to get there to, you know, like come on.
00:31:55
Jeff Rogers
But you know what she says? All right. Ballsy. Plan goes in motion. In her writings, she admits, though, that she and her editor did not believe that she was going to, one, pull off faking insanity because she was super squared away. Like, how could this woman...
00:32:13
Jeff Rogers
pretend to be crazy, okay? She was directly instructed not to sensationalize or exaggerate anything she witnessed. If she was to get in, she was told simply to report the facts, and she states, quote, the many stories I had read of abuses in such institutions I had regarded as wildly exaggerated or else romanticized, yet there was a latent desire to know positively.
00:32:44
Jeff Rogers
Okay, so she had already heard of how horrible these places were, but she like she was like, no way. No way they're that bad, right? So she moved herself into the temporary home for females, which was a boarding house, under the alias Nellie Brown. Real big difference there, okay?
00:33:02
Jeff Rogers
While there, she exhibited, quote, odd behavior. She feigned amnesia. She complained of frequent and constant headaches, and she spent hours staring blankly at walls. she muttered to herself, forced insomnia, and would make wild accusations against others. The other women were notably fearful of her by the end of the very first fucking night in the boarding house, okay?
00:33:28
Jeff Rogers
She checks herself in. Not checks herself in. She walks in. She's like, hey, I want to stay here. And it was a boarding home for working females. So they were all supposed to be, like, squared away. They just needed an interim place, right?
00:33:43
Jeff Rogers
So her behavior even managed to cause some of the other women in the house to have written down and reported vivid nightmares of this single night that she was in the boarding home. These women wrote in their diaries about their experiences with Nellie Brown.
00:34:02
Jeff Rogers
They're fucking horrible. One woman in the house continued to stay by her side and attempt to soothe and help her. Nellie remembered being profoundly impressed by her sympathy and her willingness to stop the other woman from talking about her or teasing her. She even refused to abandon her when the other woman simply said, you should not be in a room with someone so crazy.
00:34:23
Jeff Rogers
Of this woman, Nellie wrote, quote, how much i admired that little woman's courage and kindness how how i longed to reassure her and whisper that i was not insane and how i hoped that if any poor girl should ever be so unfortunate as to be what i was pretending to be she might meet with one who possessed the same spirit of human kindness possessed by miss ruth kane however the behavior and commotion was causing stir and it drew the attention of the assistant matron miss Irene Stenard and plenty of other residents.
00:35:04
Jeff Rogers
So of her other housemates willingness and the ease with which they believed she was indeed insane, Bly recalled that she felt no ill will towards them and forgave them for their concerns because that was her intended goal in the end, right? So
00:35:19
Jeff Rogers
she was She played the part. And after the fact, some people would be like, hey, well, why did you think? Why, why were you so quick to to judge me and be mean to me and shun me? Well, I mean, Bly couldn't be mad. That's what she wanted. So she made sure to note that like they they were totally normal and she doesn't fault them for anything that they did. Yeah.
00:35:43
Jeff Rogers
So... The assistant matron involved the police because if everyone's getting all up in a row, right, she needs to get some set type type of control. So the matron involved the police who quickly deemed Nellie disturbed.
00:35:59
Jeff Rogers
She was taken to the Essex Market Police Court where Judge Duffy, whom she believed looked too kind to believe her act, endeavored to find out about her situation.
00:36:12
Jeff Rogers
And the tale of her walking from the temporary boarding house, her getting taken from there to the courthouse was actually quite interesting. you know She played the part very, very, very well. And it was good.
00:36:28
Jeff Rogers
And I can't wait for you to read her story. It's very quick. okay Okay. So... He seemed to believe that because of her good clothing and her perfect English that she belonged to somebody. Somebody cared for her. She was somebody's woman, whether it be daughter, or sister, spouse, whatever. So Beliah was like, well, fuck.
00:36:50
Jeff Rogers
I think I'm to fail. If this guy keeps looking into me, like i need to I need to make this. better i need to I need to stop looking so quote respectable. right So Duffy decided that something horrible must have happened to this woman of such good breeding to have made her this way.
00:37:08
Jeff Rogers
right He said maybe she was drugged. Maybe she was brought to the city. um He said take her to Bellevue Hospital for an eval. But while he's...
00:37:21
Jeff Rogers
while they're there in the courthouse still, she's waiting because she needs the ambulance with the physician to come to the courthouse and take her to Bellevue. So she's, she's there and reporters are being called her. Like who's this lovely, well-off, well-dressed woman? Like, let's figure it out She's like freaking the fuck out that somebody from the reporting community is going recognize her. So she's doing everything in her power to avoid being seen or noticed by any of them.
00:37:47
Jeff Rogers
So, She was like, I look too sane. So she wanted to correct their opinions of her. And she jumps up out of the seat while she's waiting, runs around the courtroom screaming.
00:38:01
Jeff Rogers
An ambulance physician arrives to examine her and says it is absolutely necessary to transport her to Bellevue. And as she gets to the hospital, the physicians quickly make the decision on her mental stability slash instability.
00:38:18
Jeff Rogers
The initial eval, she then got taken to their insane ward at Bellevue. Okay, she's still here in New York. She's still in Bellevue. um And in the ward, she met an absolutely lovely nurse who was kind to her and then a not so lovely kind of twatish nurse, some may say.
00:38:40
Jeff Rogers
She was again evaluated by a physician who, upon concluding his exam, deemed her, quote, positively demented and, quote, a positively hopeless case.
00:38:53
Jeff Rogers
Who needed to be put somewhere to be taken care of.
00:38:58
Jeff Rogers
The horrors Nellie was expecting to endure or encounter at Blackwell's Island began long before she even arrived there. The conditions at Bellevue and Sane Ward were notably poor.
00:39:08
Jeff Rogers
The food was horrible. The temperature was frigid. The sleeping arrangements were absolute shit. And the staff gave zero fucks about the patients in the ward. The other women present on the ward seemed to be just as sane as Nellie was.
00:39:22
Jeff Rogers
Their only flaw being that family or friends did not want them and they had been sent to Bellevue. Nellie underwent two more psychiatric evaluations at Bellevue Ward.
00:39:36
Jeff Rogers
ah Psychiatric evaluations, a very, very terrible.
00:39:39
Jeff Rogers
vague term for what happened, right? Because we in the ER know psych evals. This was not one. okay These were not those. This is not a psych eval. One of the most important things that Nellie realized at this early stage in her adventure was that the physicians were absolutely inept and completely incapable of truly determining the sanity of people they evaluate. okay She hasn't even made it to the fucking insane island yet.
00:40:06
Jeff Rogers
She's just at Bellevue. So she spends a weekend at the Bellevue Insane Ward. The boat arrives to take her to Blackwell's Island Asylum. The boat ride over was disgusting.
00:40:19
Jeff Rogers
Okay, this is, what did we say, 1886? Yeah. Right? Imagine a boat ride from New York proper to what I assume is like Liberty Island, right? Like just, just there's a fucking insane ward right there.
00:40:35
Jeff Rogers
horrible, bad conditions, foul smelling, nasty workers, stiflingly still air. And they arrive on the Island. Nellie is greeted by a man who in response to her saying, Hey, where are we?
00:40:47
Jeff Rogers
He simply responds with Blackwell's Island. It's an insane place where you will never get out of plain and simple. She's like, this is this is good. They promise they'll get rid of me. This That's scary.
00:41:02
Jeff Rogers
scary
00:41:04
Jeff Rogers
So Nellie and the four women, because they took... that Bellevue is basically like a stopping point.
00:41:10
Jeff Rogers
The people that were in Bellevue with her were also taken to Blackwell. So Nellie and the four women who were taken with her from Bellevue ah were then taken from the docking site directly to another psychiatric evaluation. How do you think this one went?
00:41:27
Jeff Rogers
Same as the last. About even worse though. okay Because... They sat them all out in the hallway and pulled them into the office one-to-one. Okay.
00:41:37
Jeff Rogers
It was a doctor and a nurse in the room evaluating this patient. And Nellie, as she sat outside on the benches in the hallway waiting for her turn to go, she listened as each of her companions spoke clearly and sanely to describe their circumstances and plead their cases. And they were like giving of variety of reasons why, like, I should not be here.
00:42:02
Jeff Rogers
Same as you and I can say like, hey, yeah, I mean, we have bad days, but we shouldn't be in a fucking insane ward. Maybe. She listened as the, well, phew. No, I definitely don't belong. Trust me.
00:42:15
Jeff Rogers
But she listened as the doctor and nurse, just kind of laughed everything off at and that the patient said. And then they chatted between themselves, dismissed whatever the women were saying. They kind of flirted between each other and
00:42:30
Jeff Rogers
The worst part is that one of the women taken with Nellie was a Miss Louise Shands. She was taken in to meet with Dr. Kenyer and Nellie could hear through the door as the doctor and his nurse left back and forth about not being able to really understand the patient because she spoke only German.
00:42:51
Jeff Rogers
The patient spoke only German. So the doctor says to her, to the nurse, like, hey, don't you speak a little bit of German? The nurse acts embarrassed because to be able to speak German in the early nineteen hundreds that's kind of shit, right? So the nurse is like, no, I don't. And then she says, okay, fine. I speak a little bit.
00:43:09
Jeff Rogers
She starts to interpret what Miss Shands is saying and basically surmises that, no, she's crazy. Yeah, she shouldn't be here or she should be here. So they make fun of Miss Shands for a very long amount of time and then they flirt between the two of them about their languages and if she's slept with anyone recently and all this kind of stuff. And they're talking with the door open with the other patients in the hallway, okay, in front of this woman who does not speak English.
00:43:36
Jeff Rogers
And so they say, you are incompetent, you are completely insane, and you are now excused from this room. You will never leave. So of this interaction, Nellie wrote, but here was a woman taken without her own consent from the free world to an asylum and there given no chance to prove her sanity, confined most probably for life behind asylum bars without even being told in her own language the why and the wherefore.
00:44:06
Jeff Rogers
And who knows what that nurse was saying. Maybe she didn't even speak German good enough. You know what i mean? like it was, ah yeah, that's crazy.
00:44:15
Jeff Rogers
I think that's one of the things that like sat icky with me was that a lot of these women who worked in the facility, a lot of the, so a lot of the staff that worked in these facilities were females.
00:44:29
Jeff Rogers
okay And so it makes me kind of, Want to punch them all in the face, right? Like, why? Why do you think that you're better than them? You won't hear their words. You won't listen to what they're saying. But, like, what? You're better off just because you don't have a husband to turn you in? You're on the other side. You don't have a family to turn you into? It's like, that must be nice, right?
00:44:51
Jeff Rogers
So... In referring to her ability to get into Blackwell, Nellie says, quote, I succeeded in getting committed to the insane war at Blackwell's Island where I spent 10 days and nights and had an experience which I shall never forget.
00:45:08
Jeff Rogers
Below follows the experience. She described the other patients as lost and hopeless. The staff was cruel and harsh and uncaring. When their orders were not followed immediately and flawlessly, they did not hesitate to threaten physical violence.
00:45:23
Jeff Rogers
The atmosphere was bleak, cold, bland, and depressing. The food was intolerable. She explained that once she got into the asylum, she let go of her fake insanity act. She was like, okay, I'm here. I'm good. I'm just going to be me However, even as she behaved and spoke in her normal fashion, she was still ignored. And she was actually deemed even more disturbed by those around her. She was treated like a stray dog. After her first horrible dinner, which was...
00:45:55
Jeff Rogers
absolutely inedible, she was taken to a washroom in front of the other patients. She was physically stripped naked in front of the patients and the staff, forced into a freezing tub to be aggressively scrubbed down by another patient.
00:46:10
Jeff Rogers
After the unceremonious cleaning, she was then put into wet clothes, And then led to a dormitory with multiple beds and other patients. As she laid in one of those beds trying to get comfortable, she was pulled out of her bed and then told that she had to sleep alone because she was reported to be too noisy.
00:46:31
Jeff Rogers
She was then thrown into a single room in her wet slip. When she asked for a nightgown, she was told that they had no such things to provide with patients. Nellie then was told, "'You're in a public institution now, and you can't expect to get anything.
00:46:47
Jeff Rogers
This is charity, and you should be thankful for whatever you do get.'" Nellie replied, but the city pays to keep these places up and pays people to be kind to the unfortunates brought here.
00:46:59
Jeff Rogers
The nurse, Ms. Group, simply said, don't expect any kindness here. You will not get it. yeah
00:47:08
Jeff Rogers
Nellie recalled that sleeping was impossible because the noises around her. She was in a single room, but she could still hear the screams of the other patients. The nurses and orderlies didn't bother to walk softly or keep their voices down. They constantly talked loudly through the hallways and the sounds of the door slamming opened and closed as the staff checked each patient never dulled.
00:47:30
Jeff Rogers
She noted that each door was individually locked and every single window was heavily barred. So escape in any form during like an emergency was near impossible because. You're just not getting out. If your door is locked.
00:47:47
Jeff Rogers
Well, so think about it like this, right? And she referenced this in terms of like, jails, as we think of it, right? you You press a button, you turn a key, all of the cell doors open, right?
00:48:00
Jeff Rogers
In this place, someone would have to have to walk down in the entire hallway, unlock with a new key each door individually, right? So she brought this is this up.
00:48:12
Jeff Rogers
and was It was one of the things that she was like, whoa, these people are going fucking die. Like, fires are going to happen. like this is a horribly... Everything is bad. Fires could happen. It's not outside of the normal. So like, let's talk about this.
00:48:26
Jeff Rogers
So she offers it up to one of the doctors as she's getting evaluated at one time and she gives suggestions for change. And he's like, well, that's stupid. Like, I mean, I get that. But like the nurses are responsible. If there's a fire, they'll go down. And and she flat out said, but you know, they won't do that.
00:48:43
Jeff Rogers
And he said, well, yeah, but what what would you have me do? And when she says have a system that unlocks all the doors at once, he goes, the only other place I've seen that is in Sing Sing.
00:48:56
Jeff Rogers
Like the jail. Yeah. And she's like, well, i've never been to s same Sing Sing. Because she hadn't. She had been to visit people in prisons in Pittsburgh, but she had never been to Sing Sing. And she had never been in jail. She had just visited. But she couldn't say that because she was supposed to be this anonymous person, right?
00:49:14
Jeff Rogers
So the doctor brushes her off and is like, cool, cool, cool, cool. My suggestions always go over so well. So yeah, sure. I'll i'll say that we do that. So she said, oddly enough, that the saner and more coherent she behaved, the crazier all of the doctors said that she was, except for the one physician that she spoke to.
00:49:33
Jeff Rogers
Frequently, she would ask for her notebook and pencil to be returned to her because she came in. and That was all she came in with, her clothes and her notebook and pencil. And then as the hours wore on, the days wore on, they told her, no, you didn't have that. Like,
00:49:47
Jeff Rogers
Maybe you had a notebook. Oh, no, you didn't have a notebook. Well, you had a notebook. You had a pencil. Maybe you had a pencil. Maybe you didn't. And then finally, she got to the point where she was like, I had a notebook. I had a pencil. And they said, no, no, no, no no honey.
00:50:00
Jeff Rogers
Don't give in to your imaginations. Good God. And then she watched a nurse walk away with her notebook and pencil. Okay. So the brutal conditions continued day in, day out, up early after absolutely no sleep.
00:50:16
Jeff Rogers
Horrible food that had bugs in it, okay? Like her bread had bugs baked into it. The bread was just fucking horrible. The slop that they called oatmeal, like nothing was, it was exactly as you would picture it in an early nineteen hundreds late 1800s fucking insane time. It's horrible, horrible, horrible.
00:50:37
Jeff Rogers
So one of the things that she had kind of mentioned initially upon her entry was that it was such a clean place. It was, it looked well cared for. She felt that it was because of the staff.
00:50:49
Jeff Rogers
Who, who do you think did the cleaning? Who do you think kept it up? The patients. The patients. So surprise, surprise. They eat this horrible food. They can't sleep at night. They wake up, they eat horrible food again. And then they have to do all of the work to clean the facility.
00:51:04
Jeff Rogers
So mistreatment from the staff was yeah regular, hourly, half-hourly, minutely, right? And she was repeatedly told to shut up. Anytime she spoke when not directly spoken to, she was told to shut up.
00:51:19
Jeff Rogers
On a morning walk with the other patients for their outside airtime, Nellie witnessed a variety of women in differing states of distress. And she describes it as people who are like as sane as her to who you actually believe to belong in this place. Raving, screaming, bonkers, lunatics, right? And she said that there were people from all over that spectrum there with her.
00:51:46
Jeff Rogers
But there was a line of women all connected at the waist by a cable rope that was wrapped around leather belts on their waist. They were pulling a cart behind them like pack meals.
00:51:59
Jeff Rogers
She remembered them with horror and as she recalled their vacant eyes and meaningless faces, she asked about them and she was told they are the most violent and miserable wretches here. There was next another miserable night eating dinner.
00:52:16
Jeff Rogers
The superintendent of the facility walked through, like asking everyone, hey, how you doing, what like that kind of thing, never actually stopping to listen to their responses. But everyone responded with, oh, it's lovely, everything's great. And Nellie asked, why do the women not speak up about their suffering?
00:52:34
Jeff Rogers
Every single one of them responded with, if we said anything, we would be beat. We have to keep quiet or we will not live. Mm-hmm.
00:52:44
Jeff Rogers
So the meals became more awful awful and unbearable. Few of the women, even the most insane, couldn't even tolerate eating the food. So the other patients grew sicker over the days. The treatment of the patients became more immune.
00:52:56
Jeff Rogers
A blind elderly patient, probably somewhere in her 60s or 70s, was complaining of colds. It was cold. They didn't have any heat on. Right? And she's old as fuck. Yeah.
00:53:08
Jeff Rogers
She asked simply for like a shawl to wear. In return for this request, she was physically restrained by multiple nurses who left...
00:53:20
Jeff Rogers
almost chaotically, and forced her to remain silent as they ran their cold hands down her face and neck and her pathetically thin dress, okay?
00:53:34
Jeff Rogers
Blind. And as they released her and she stumbled away, trying to grip the wall to find out where she was, they laughed again as she tripped over objects in her bath.
00:53:45
Jeff Rogers
That is just karma waiting. No, these are, well, I mean. Like the people doing that to the blind woman? Blind and in her 70s. That is some mean karma coming back. All she wanted it was a fucking shawl because it's cold as dick in here. Like, get over it.
00:54:03
Jeff Rogers
So, and this is just like day two, okay? these women Some of these women had been there for years before Nellie got there. So more and more, she heard and saw women crying out to God and begging for death, screaming to be killed instead of enduring what they were.
00:54:21
Jeff Rogers
She witnessed violent beatings on a regular basis for no other reason than it entertained the nurses. Over her days, Nellie gathered the stories from women who were with her. The reasons for them being in the asylum ranged from things from simply not speaking English, like Miss Shands, to having the audacity to get angry when someone intentionally provoked them. There was this one woman who she was admitted to the insane asylum because she yelled at another female because she had a whole like rack of clean laundry.
00:54:55
Jeff Rogers
and the woman took it down and put it in the dirt. And so the woman who had been cleaning it yelled, at that person who intentionally fucked up her clean laundry. Damn. So that woman was then committed to the insane asylum.
00:55:08
Jeff Rogers
And then someone else who had gone to the city to ask for financial assistance in a time of need was then committed to a fucking insane asylum. She was the mother of like four, had a husband. Nobody fucking knew where she went. They took her from the courthouse where she applied for financial assistance to an insane asylum. Okay. Jesus.
00:55:27
Jeff Rogers
Yeah. So she met so many people who showed not a single fucking drop of true insanity, mania, depression, psychosis, nothing.
00:55:40
Jeff Rogers
They were just regular women like her. Yeah. Quote, I left the insane world with the pleasure and regret pleasure that I was once more able to enjoy the free breath of heaven Regret that I could not have brought with me some of the unfortunate women who lived and suffered with me and who I am convinced are just as sane as I was and am now myself.
00:56:07
Jeff Rogers
Throughout her entire undercover ordeal, Bly recalled multiple people who stuck out in her mind as good and kind people that she did not want to forget. Of them all, she repeatedly spoke the way she did of Mrs. Kane, who was the woman in the boarding house.
00:56:23
Jeff Rogers
Simply saying that she hoped that any person truly unfortunate or ah unwell would have the opportunity to encounter someone like them in their ordeal. Mrs. Kane from the boarding house, Judge Duffy, policeman Brockert, who was the one who escorted her from the boarding house to the jail, the ambulance physician who believed her and was like, I don't think she's crazy.
00:56:43
Jeff Rogers
There's nothing in her that seems crazy. And then Mary Ball from the Bellevue Insane Ward. She went on to write her six-part series about her encounter entitled Ten Days in the Mouth House. And yeah i'm telling you, I could quote, i I could just put the whole fucking thing in here. It's just so good.
00:57:02
Jeff Rogers
So good. She said, here is a class of women sent to be cured. I would like the expert physicians who are condemning me for my action, which has proven their ability to take a perfectly sane and healthy woman.
00:57:16
Jeff Rogers
Shut her up. Make her sit from 6 a.m. to 8 p.m. on a straight back bench. Do not allow her to talk or to move during these hours. Give her no reading and let her know nothing of the world or its doings.
00:57:28
Jeff Rogers
Give her bad food and harsh treatment and see how long it will take to make her insane. Mm-hmm. After her release or rescue, i guess, I mean, there was not much about that. She was day 10. She was called and said, hey, there's someone to visit you. And then she just got whisked away. Okay.
00:57:46
Jeff Rogers
So after the rescue, she was summoned before the grand jury. She told the panel of 23 men. So it's 23 dudes. It's jury. They're like, yeah, sure. Lady from the insane. I'm like, tell me about your story.
00:58:00
Jeff Rogers
She told her time as Nellie Brown on Blackwell Island. After hearing every single word under sworn testimony on the Bible, the jurors said, you know what? Let's go.
00:58:13
Jeff Rogers
Let me go with you. Come with us back to Blackwell and we'll figure it out. We want to see what you experienced, okay? So the trip was supposed to be a secret and a surprise. No one was supposed to know.
00:58:24
Jeff Rogers
But someone let it slip and they were forewarned. From the moment their trip started, everything was different. The boat that they traveled on was pristine and fresh and clean smelling. There was nothing filthy like the one that she and her other women had been on.
00:58:43
Jeff Rogers
The nurses on the island contradicted Nellie's story. The doctors swore ignorance of any wrongdoing. One of the women she had been close with was brought down to speak with the members of the jury.
00:58:54
Jeff Rogers
She corroborated Nellie's story. They toured the facilities and found it spotless, pristine. The kitchens had fresh, great smelling food in it, barrels of spices and seasoning in in buckets and buckets. The bathing rooms had brand new tubs with fresh linens on all the beds. The beds were squishy. They were very comfortable.
00:59:19
Jeff Rogers
And Nellie said, quote, the institution was on exhibition, not a fault could be found. So.
00:59:30
Jeff Rogers
Nellie's like, well, fuck, nobody's going to believe me. I just told this whole tale. And like, yes, this other person said yes, all of it's true. But like, she's also from a fucking loony bed. So no one's going believe me. So some of the women that Nellie, actually all except for one of the women that Nellie had mentioned and interacted with were missing.
00:59:52
Jeff Rogers
None of them could be found. Some of them had been reportedly discharged in the two weeks between Nellie's release and their visit. They had been sent to their families.
01:00:03
Jeff Rogers
Nobody could name a location. Some, according to nurses, had never existed at all. Many were relocated to other parts of the the facility, but the jurors were not granted access. And then one of them, who Nellie noted had been in previously exceptional physical health, was now, quote, unquote, dying of paralysis and could not be seen.
01:00:28
Jeff Rogers
So Nellie's in a fucking fit right now. She's like, I just did this thing. All of these women are now being punished for me, et cetera, et cetera, right? She was frantic to figure out any additional advice that she could use. But as she was fretting over finding new ways to make them believe her, They surprised the fuck out of her by accepting every single word she said. They granted her the opportunity to write proposals for improvements to be made.
01:00:54
Jeff Rogers
And they finalized their report on the institution by advising that every single one of Nellie Bly's suggestions be enacted. So her work rapidly made her one of the most famous journalists in the country.
01:01:07
Jeff Rogers
The attention it brought to Blackwell's Island and every other asylum was explosive. The public was mortified and there was this public outcry to pour more funding into the facilities to improve the conditions. The city of New York appropriated $1 million dollars per year. million in nineteen hundred more per year to caring for the insane whoa it's amazing Her foray into the asylum with the hands-on approach was the actual beginning of the term investigative journalism.
01:01:42
Jeff Rogers
With her newfound public image, she continued to publish regular expose pieces that drew attention to additional problems throughout New York, including corruption in the state legislature, unscrupulous employment agencies for domestic workers, and a black market for infant buying, which what the fuck?
01:02:01
Jeff Rogers
What the fuck? What the fuck? What the fuck? That's insane. Buying, babe. She captivated audiences and was able to encourage changes with her writing.
01:02:13
Jeff Rogers
A few years later, she decided that she wanted to take a trip around the world. She inspired she was inspired by Jules Verne's Around the World in 80 Days. Her editor was like, yeah, fucking go for it.
01:02:25
Jeff Rogers
So she took off with nothing but a backpack. Okay, a backpack. Again, this is the nineteen early 1900s. She takes a but backpack. She's like, I'm going fucking do it.
01:02:36
Jeff Rogers
I'm a woman. I'm solo. I'm doing it. She does it 72 days. this pitch So trains, boats, cars, she circumnavigated the entire world. She sent back every day. She sent a dispatch back by post or wire or something to detail her adventures. And the new New York World published every single day an update on her journey. The entire country and world followed her story.
01:03:05
Jeff Rogers
And not only did she complete it, but she did it in fewer days well than the story. Well, is like um Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers. She's doing everything backwards and in heels.
01:03:16
Jeff Rogers
every Do you know what I mean? So she's 10 times better. in two years Oh my God, I'm so proud of Backwards in heels. Watch me now. Badassiest of badass women.
01:03:28
Jeff Rogers
I don't know if I like that word badass I don't know if I like it we gotta to think something else we'll talk no I don't badassiest I love that it doesn't matter she's a badass woman she went around the fucking world in 72 days i gotta figure out a new word though badassiest I don't like it I like the way you say it badassiest yeah there you go badass there you go don't like that at all so yeah i mean it is that thing where she is woman so she's gonna do something similar to a man she's got to be 10 times better unfortunately she only held that title for like a brief period of whatever does not matter someone did surprise her but but barely and it was a man right like it was a man he surpassed her by like what 72 days or 70 70 days or something like that
01:04:20
Jeff Rogers
so She held the title, though. First of all, she was the first to fucking do it after Jules Verne's like thing, right? And she was like, let me fucking do it. The second one wasn't the first. No, he wasn't. No, he fucking wasn't. yeah Goddamn right. um So she received international acclaim. There were parades. Fucking everyone loved it.
01:04:40
Jeff Rogers
ah Her works continued to challenge the status quo, and she shook things up everywhere she went. She wrote influential pieces. She interviewed prominent individuals like anarchist activists and the writer Emma Goldman, the socialist politician and labor organizer Eugene V. Debs.
01:04:57
Jeff Rogers
She covered major national stories related to protests in favor of workers' rights, the march of Jacob Cox's army on D.C., and the Pullman strike in Chicago when she was only 30 years old. All of this happened before she was 30, okay? Like, let's fucking be honest.
01:05:15
Jeff Rogers
Whoa, what were we doing before 30? I mean, you were traveling the world. I was not. That's insane. She married us Robert Seaman, who happened to be a fucking millionaire already. Okay. Millionaire. This is in the early nineteen hundreds Like, that's the thing that blows my mind is these people are fucking millionaires in the early nineteen hundreds Come on. okay She's also traveling around the world in 1900. She's inventing investigative journalism. She's doing the goddamn thing. She was putting people in their place and she's telling them that she will not sit back. She will not remain silent and she's fucking doing it. And she did it
01:05:56
Jeff Rogers
So she retires from journalism because she's like, I'm married to a millionaire. Like I'm 30. Let's just relax. Yeah. Unfortunately, in 1903, after just a few years of marriage, Robert dies. With his death, though, she is now in control of the Ironclad Manufacturing Company and the Steel Barrel Company, which were both the biggest industries in the in the war in the fucking United States at the time, okay? Yeah.
01:06:25
Jeff Rogers
So in addition to her amazing writing and investigative journalism, she loved adventure, but she also liked inventing and tinkering. Like, because why not, right? So as she's now the owner of these multi-million dollar companies, she's like, let me just dabble here.
01:06:44
Jeff Rogers
So she does. She invents and files for patents for a couple of things. The novel milk can, which I don't know what that is. don't i don't know. And then the stackable garbage container. Also, I have no idea what that is. Seems important though, right? And then as the owner of those manufacturing companies, she flourished. She patented in several inventions related to oil manufacturing that are still used today.
01:07:11
Jeff Rogers
okay. She prioritized employee welfare. She provided healthcare benefits and recreational facilities for her workers because from the jump, this was all about working conditions. She started her journalistic career as a person who was like, let's fuck these poor factory conditions. Let's make something better.
01:07:31
Jeff Rogers
But unfortunately, as she was trying to give her employees the best working conditions possible, Many took advantage of her and began stealing from her and she was not financially savvy. So she fell victim to fraud.
01:07:45
Jeff Rogers
um And then one of the firms had to declare bankruptcy. She returned back to journalism. Again, she's like in her early thirty s though. So why the fuck not? um And she then began reporting from the Eastern Front during the First World War. Hmm.
01:08:01
Jeff Rogers
During this, at one point, she was even captured and arrested under the suspicion of being a spy. Obviously, she was released. And then in 1922, Nellie Bly, a.k.a. Mary Elizabeth Cochran, a.k.a. Elizabeth Cochran Seaman, died of pneumonia. In what year? 1922. Oh.
01:08:26
Jeff Rogers
oh Yeah. Her legacy and the changes that she brought about live on today over a century after her death. Oh, Good job. That was good. She's fun, right? Yeah, that was good.
01:08:42
Jeff Rogers
oh God. i
01:08:45
Jeff Rogers
Text me and I will bring you the – because printed out her –
01:08:52
Jeff Rogers
10 days in the... i have I've heard this story before. yeah and it just stuck with me enough just to like jot her name down in my phone. So I knew there was still like she has work that you can read today.
01:09:05
Jeff Rogers
and I was going to read that. She's got so much. This is just like ah so much. this is This is the only thing that I could like narrow down. But she is such an extraordinary was such an extraordinary fucking journalist. And like
01:09:21
Jeff Rogers
I think for me, I think tonight you need to watch Stonehurst Asylum. Is that a movie? It is a movie. Okay. Again, based on Edgar Allan Poe's story. Okay.
01:09:32
Jeff Rogers
And then tomorrow I will bring you her writings. The, uh...
01:09:38
Jeff Rogers
What's it called? You know, the the thing. 10 days. 10 days. And a madhouse. And a madhouse. So i will i will I will bring that to you because i print I found them and I printed them all out because I was like, I need... Because everywhere you look online, it'll give you like a snippet of like, yeah, she wrote this and she did this thing and then she wrote this thing about her time. And i was like, I need to know. I need to know about her experiences in there. So I finally fucking found it in... i don't even know. I think it was...
01:10:07
Jeff Rogers
It was University of Pennsylvania, I think, was the source that I found, finally found. I had to create a fucking student ID and, like, I scammed the shit out of this website just to get to print out her writings. Allegedly. Allegedly. That's what somebody else did. I didn't do that.
01:10:31
Jeff Rogers
I'm a University of Pennsylvania student. university it's kind of that thing, though, that we do, that when you – start to like the Tulsa massacre race massacre that I did last week.
01:10:42
Jeff Rogers
It is that thing you do where you are interested enough to start doing the story about it, but then like you just need to do more. There's like a block, right? yeah there's You can only get so far on the regular interweb and then you have to pay to go deeper. I'm like, God damn, if I don't pay every single time to go deeper or make up some sort of. can I wonder if you can buy her book.
01:11:07
Jeff Rogers
You probably can, yeah but I didn't know if didn't think about that I didn't know if it would come. Cause she, she initially wrote it in that six part series and then she, they, they, they put it together in a book.
01:11:20
Jeff Rogers
So what I have is i have her 10 days in the madhouse and then there's other writings from her as well that I printed out for, I didn't print them out. Someone else it from the University of Pennsylvania. Yeah. And I asked them to borrow it. That's what happened.
01:11:35
Jeff Rogers
That was good. she's I I can take that one off my list. It was so fun to like, God, cut and the the whole time. What she wrote was so important that it changed things. A million fucking dollars a year.
01:11:55
Jeff Rogers
In the late 1800s, New York was like, oh, we were fucking up. Okay, we should fix this. A million. in the What? What? I mean, it's still not good. Like, we know this.
01:12:08
Jeff Rogers
Yeah. But... God. But she made it better, and she did it. While dancing backwards in high heels. She went in there, and she was like, I hope somebody gets me out.
01:12:19
Jeff Rogers
And that's one of the things, like... In her writings, it's it's late 1800s, writing is... to the time right so you read it and you're like don't know make any sense at all like that sounds weird but if you bring it back you're like oh she's fucking terrified yeah she genuinely is like i don't know if i'll ever get out of here that's insane but i'm gonna do it anyway i'm gonna do it and i'm gonna do my best and like there's there's no indication of like
01:12:51
Jeff Rogers
What happened to those other women who she had befriended while she was there? There's no you know, and so it's kind of sad because, yes, she did encounter genuinely crazy people there, but there were so many of them who were not.
01:13:08
Jeff Rogers
That just spoke German. and that just German or or had a horribly intense Irish accent. like she It's just horrible. like And the way that, again, i think for me, i as I was reading it, I was like,
01:13:27
Jeff Rogers
These nurses are awful, awful, awful, awful. Like I get it. I can't imagine being a nurse in a quote unquote insane asylum. But like when you find a sane person or someone who is mellow and chill and like might actually not belong there, wouldn't you want to be better to them? Be like, oh, thank God you're here. Like this is this is such a reprieve. I love it.
01:13:52
Jeff Rogers
No, instead they treated them even worse. It's insane. Yeah. pushing a blind woman around, stripping people down. Like you can't even say that it was treated like bad dogs. Like they were just.
01:14:05
Jeff Rogers
And the thing that I read is the bath water that they used was the same for every person. Every single, every single patient. Cold, dirty bath water that was used on every patient. Every single patient. Yep.
01:14:17
Jeff Rogers
Okay. Yeah. That was good. That's it, man. So we're mid-January. You and I are in Egypt, Africa, doing our damn thing. We're now like a couple hours from landing.
01:14:30
Jeff Rogers
we're chilling. I'm probably like nodding off reading a book right now. I'm hopefully asleep. Yeah. God made Xanax for a reason.
01:14:41
Jeff Rogers
All right. Well, we're here for a good time. Not a long time. There you go. You it right. And I'll do it wrong next week. Absolutely. That's my promise to you Thank you, everybody, for listening. Bye.
01:15:13
Jeff Rogers
Yeah, please.