Ten Days in a Mad-House;Feigning Insanity in Order to Reveal Asylum Horrors

"Ten Days in a Mad-House" is an 1887 work by American journalist Elizabeth Seaman. Originally published as a series of articles for the New York World, the book contains Seaman's ground-breaking expos of an asylum which she infiltrated by feigning insanity. "Ten Days in a Mad-House" led to a grand jury investigation and increased funding for the Department of Public Charities and Corrections, as well as an entirely new style of investigative journalism. Elizabeth Cochrane Seaman (1864-1922), also known as Nellie Bly, was an American industrialist, journalist, charity worker, and inventor famous for her 72-day trip around the world in the footsteps of the fictional Phileas Fogg. Other notable works by this author include: "Six Months in Mexico" (1888), "The Mystery of Central Park" (1889), and "Nellie Bly's Book: Around the World in Seventy-two Days" (1890). Read & Co. Books is republishing this classic journalistic work in a new edition complete with an introductory biography by Frances E. Willard and Mary A. Livermore.