All the Nellie Blys

I am not saying that there is any relationship between the two Cochran families. But while I was hunting the ghost of Nellie Bly Sawyers I made this weird discovery.

The more famous “Nellie Bly”

 was born in 1864 in Pittsburg. Her real name is Elizabeth Jane Cochran. Her father was Michael Cochran and her mother named Mary Jane. They spent their whole lives in the Pittsburg area.

Who is the famous “Nellie Bly” you may ask? I am sure the name is ringing in the back of your mind as vaguely familiar. Nellie Bly is the pen name of Elizabeth Jane Cochrane Seaman. She was a writer, industrialist, inventor, charity worker and world traveler. 

She took on a writing assignment in 1887 to expose the abuse in asylums and spent 10 days undercover in a Women's Lunatic Asylum on Blackwell's Island. 

This tale is to be released as a movie in the late summer of 2015 starry Caroline Barry, ChristopherLambert, Julia Chantrey and Kelly LaBrock. The movie is titled 10 Days in a Madhouse.

Inspired by Jules Verne’s Book Around the World in 80 Days and the character Phelias Fogg she went around the world in 72 days in 1889. She traveled by train and by ship. She actually meets Jules Verne while in Paris during this trip.

My Nellie Bly was born in 1909 in West Virginia. That is her name although she went by Nell as she grew into womanhood. What caught my attention was that in 1930 living right next door to my Nellie Bly Sawyers and her family is the Maywood Cochran family.  

In 1850 Stephen Foster wrote a song “Nelly Bly”. He lived in Pittsburgh for several years off and on and is buried there. His song Nelly Bly was the inspiration for the pen name of Elizabeth Jane Cochrane and was given to her by the staff at the Pittsburgh "Dispatch” newspaper. In their haste to meet the copy deadline for the paper the name was misspelled Nellie and by the end of the day it was too late to change it.

How my Nell Bly got her name is a mystery.

 I have found a newspaper article from 1936 for a Nellie Sawyers who was sentenced to prison for 6 months for “violating liquor laws”. On her third offense she was charged with a liquor offense and sentenced to two years and fined $300. Does this mean that she was operating a still on her daddy’s farm? Making gin in an old bathtub in the barn? This Nellie however is not my Nellie. I am sure there is an interesting and tragic story for this Nellie. 

Just in case you were wondering Nelly Blighs are eyes. Just ask Basher from all the Danny Ocean films.