Becoming Nellie Bly
And so, in 1885, she started her career as a journalist, earning five dollars a week reporting on various topics of the day. That’s when she started using the pen name Nellie Bly, which was taken from a song by the musician Stephen Foster. Working for The Pittsburgh Dispatch, she went undercover in a factory to expose the low pay and terrible working conditions.
Stephen Collins Foster. Photo by Granger / Shutterstock
But instead of being appreciated for her investigative reporting, she was banished to the women’s pages. Disgusted, she left her position and took a job as a foreign correspondent. In 1886, she traveled to Mexico, where she spent six months reporting on Mexican culture and the poor conditions and corruption its people endured.