Ten Days in a Mad-House

Public Domain

Editor’s Note

“Ten Days in a Mad-House is a book written by newspaper reporter Nellie Bly and published by Norman Munro in New York City in 1887. The book comprised Blyʼs reportage for the New York World while on an undercover assignment in which she feigned insanity to investigate reports of brutality and neglect at the Womenʼs Lunatic Asylum on Blackwellʼs Island.”

The full text of this edition published by Norman L. Munro is available on Wikisource at this link.

Public domain image of Nellie Bly from Wikimedia Commons. Adapted by the Observatory.

Nellie Bly

Elizabeth Jane Cochrane (1864–1922) was an American journalist who wrote under the pseudonym Nellie Bly. She feigned insanity in order to write an exposé about a mental institution. (Source: Wikisource).

This work was published before January 1, 1929, and is in the public domain worldwide because the author died at least 100 years ago. It was abridged and adapted by the Observatory from a version produced by Wikisource contributors.

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