Sensational: The Hidden History of America's “Girl Stunt Reporters”

"Sensational" tells the story of the “girl stunt reporters” of the late 19th century, and the print culture that they helped shape. Nellie Bly started the trend by going undercover at a women’s insane asylum to report on the treatment there, but the book doesn’t stop there. We get to hear about the lives and works of many trailblazing women who shaped the conversations in their culture.

During the 1880s and 1890s, having a “girl reporter” was an asset and it provided a place for women at newspapers. Their articles were sensational, revealing, and told in an engaging first-person voice. A personality in writing and guts to do anything outrageous were valued above formal education, although the women eventually felt the show more pressure of the precedent which demanded that they do dangerous stories. The “girl stunt reporter” often became the heroine of the story she was covering, and readers followed her work as one would a movie star.

It’s sometimes hard to keep track of who is who, but I appreciate that Kim Todd weaves together the major headlines and stories of the years she covers, rather than simply highlighting one woman per chapter. Sensational lived up to its name and it is one of my favorite books of the year. show less

Loved this nonfiction look at “girl reporters” in the late 1800s. Their efforts in investigative & stunt reporting helped create the genre we now call creative nonfiction. I can’t believe all these women went through just to be journalists. It makes me value my job all the more. The reporters who worked in factories or spent time in asylums to researched a story were brave and inspiring.

“You thought I was part of your story, but really you are part of mine.”

This book had no reason to be as long as it was, and was repetitive. Decades were covered over and over and over for whole chapters, with only slightly varying information. A better team of editors would have produced a more streamlined book. Otherwise, the book was wonderful! I learned a lot, and the writing style was engaging. The choices of who to profile and how was so interesting, as was the placement of portraits and illustrations. I was stunned to learn about where medicine was in regards to abortion in the 1880s, and societal views. I really appreciated that so much time was spent on it, and how the book pointed things out, for lack of better phrasing. This is a dense, long read. I thought it would be breezy and fun, and instead show more I learned a lot. I'm glad I got to read this. show less

A look back to the origins of investigative reporting. During the Gilded Age, a number of women eager to ply their writing skills, were hired by newspapers to go “undercover” or often to fake an incident to gather reportable information. The most famous was Nellie Bly who faked her way into a women’s asylum to reveal the horrendous treatment that was meted out to the inmates. There were so many others who made their mark at this time. One undercover reporter presented herself to a number of doctors requesting an abortion, thus exposing doctors who were treating women underground with questionable techniques and devastating results. Her true identity has never been found. Unfortunately, most of these reporters were not held in high show more regard and suffered all the inequities of their time in terms of pay, job assignments, and general respect. I found the author’s last several chapters the most interesting as she described her research process and brought the topic up to date. show less

I don't know exactly how to review this book. I was excited by learning that this would be a book about female reporters of the Gilded Age, like Nelly Bly. (I loved her exposé on mental institutions that I had read previously!) This book is filled with "stunts" like this and showcases the bias women reporters were shown. I have to admit that I was amazed at how many women wanted to do such things...but there you have it! This book also shows how investigative reporting started, and it seems that it all started with women newspaper reporters!

The first part of this book (and it dragged) was about abortionists, abortion drugs, and the exposés the women reporters managed on the Doctor's and Pharmacists.

The years never seem to change, just show more some of the reporters. 400 pages (or thereabouts) to cover what should have been 10 or more years but concentrated on about 4 years. Now we add racial bigotry and women's rights into the mix. This takes a large part of the book and is well covered.

We also have long discussions of the feud between newspaper owners such as William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer.

Finally, we get to the turn of the century, and even some modern authors, though there isn't a huge coverage on them-one chapter.

These are very long chapters -that is a particular complaint of mine but not anyone else, so just ignore that I said that! LOL!

There are drawings, newspaper excerpts, photos, and plenty of the author's research.

*ARC supplied by the publisher, author, and Edelweiss. show less