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Speaker 1: Hey, everyone, Technically you're getting two days in History today

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Speaker 1: because we're running two episodes from the History Vault. I

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Speaker 1: hope you enjoy. Hi. I'm Eves and welcome to this

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Speaker 1: Day in History Class, a show that uncovers history one

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Speaker 1: day at a time. The day was January. After seventy

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Speaker 1: two days of traveling by train, rickshaw, horse, small boat, steamship, Donkey,

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Speaker 1: and various other vehicles, journalist Nellie Bligh step foot back

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Speaker 1: in New York to a cheering crowd. Nellie, just five

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Speaker 1: years old, has set a new record for her trip

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Speaker 1: around the world. Nellie's unprecedented trip made her famous, well

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Speaker 1: more famous. It wasn't her first time at the rodeo. Nellie,

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Speaker 1: born Elizabeth Jane Cochrane, was known for being a daring reporter.

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Speaker 1: Take Ten Days in a Madhouse, a series Nellie did

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Speaker 1: in eighties seven that pretty much epitomizes her sensational investigations.

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Speaker 1: Nellie wanted to do a story in Immigrants for The

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Speaker 1: New York World, a newspaper that was a pretty big

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Speaker 1: deal in the late nineteenth century, but she got a

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Speaker 1: no on that assignment and was told to see if

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Speaker 1: she could find out what was really going on at

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Speaker 1: the Woman's Lunatic Asylum on Blackwell's Island in New York.

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Speaker 1: To get into the asylum without tipping people off that

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Speaker 1: she was there reporting, she pretended she was a patient

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Speaker 1: after a little bit of training, and by that I

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Speaker 1: mean Nellie made quote crazy faces in a mirror and

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Speaker 1: deprived herself of sleep. Nellie was ready to convince people

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Speaker 1: she belonged in the hospital stereotypes of what mental illness

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Speaker 1: looks like the side. Nellie soon made it to black

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Speaker 1: Well's Island, and her experience there was published as a

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Speaker 1: temporary expose in the newspaper. The horrible treatment and conditions

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Speaker 1: that she exposed led to more investigation of the asylum's practices.

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Speaker 1: Yet Nellie's journalism was pretty bold, so it wasn't much

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Speaker 1: of a surprise when she read Jules verns eighteen seventy

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Speaker 1: three novel Around the World in Eighty Days and thought

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Speaker 1: it was a good idea to do the same thing

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Speaker 1: the main character, Phileas Fogg does, but in less time.

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Speaker 1: So she went to the New York World and said

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Speaker 1: something along the lines of, Hey, I want to travel

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Speaker 1: all the way around the world and write about it

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Speaker 1: for you. And it was eighteen eighty nine, so to

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Speaker 1: say the least, Nellie's proposal wasn't met with glowing acceptance.

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Speaker 1: Her managing editor was interested, but the other guys at

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Speaker 1: the newspaper not so much. Nobody's done this before, they said,

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Speaker 1: And of course a woman couldn't do it alone. Being

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Speaker 1: the daredevil she was, she told the man in charge

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Speaker 1: at the New York World to go ahead and send

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Speaker 1: a guy, and she started the trip on the same

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Speaker 1: day for another newspaper and beat him. Finally, they agreed

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Speaker 1: to send her around the world on their dime. Nellie

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Speaker 1: gave herself seventy five days to travel all the way

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Speaker 1: around the globe, and on November four, eighty nine, Nellie

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Speaker 1: off New Jersey on a steamship headed for England and

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Speaker 1: the New York Role made sure everyone knew she was

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Speaker 1: leaving with the front page story on the day of

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Speaker 1: her departure. Little did Nelly know a journalist named Elizabeth

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Speaker 1: Bislam was also just beginning her trip around the globe,

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Speaker 1: but for Cosmopolitan magazine. Yes Cosmopolitan was that petty spoiler alert.

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Speaker 1: Elizabeth didn't win the race anyway. Nellie set off on

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Speaker 1: her adventure with a bag full of just the necessities,

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Speaker 1: plus a Jiff cold cream. She went through Italy, Egypt, Singapore,

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Speaker 1: modern day Sri Lanka, Japan, and other countries, even going

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Speaker 1: off route to meet with Jules Verne in France. Along

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Speaker 1: the way, she sent her writing back to the newspaper

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Speaker 1: in New York by telegraph, cable and by ship. Nellie's

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Speaker 1: travels were definitely eventful. There was a monsoon on the

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Speaker 1: way to Hong Kong. She was proposed to by a

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Speaker 1: guy who thought she was an American heiress, and she

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Speaker 1: bought a monkey in Singapore after resisting the temptation, as

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Speaker 1: she put it, to buy a boy at Port Said

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Speaker 1: and a girl at Columbo. Yes. Nellie was a pioneering

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Speaker 1: journalist at a time when there were few women journalists

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Speaker 1: at all, let alone those who weren't pigeonholed into the

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Speaker 1: women's interest category. But many of her remarks came off

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Speaker 1: as jaded, ignorant, and even casually racist, like when she

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Speaker 1: called beggars in Hong Kong repulsive and compare the plight

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Speaker 1: of US slaves to that of poor people in Mexico City.

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Speaker 1: Nellie was complicated, regardless, The New York World made a

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Speaker 1: spectacle of all of it. They printed as many stories

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Speaker 1: as they could about her travels, even creating a contest

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Speaker 1: for guessing how long Nellie's trip would take, and readers

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Speaker 1: devoured her worldly tails, increasing the newspaper circulation numbers. When

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Speaker 1: she landed in San Francisco on January one, the New

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Speaker 1: York World charted a train to get her to New York,

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Speaker 1: where she was met by cheering crowd. She had made

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Speaker 1: it back on January nine, at three pm and exactly

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Speaker 1: seventy two day as six hours, eleven minutes, and fourteen seconds,

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Speaker 1: but despite her contributions to The New York World, her

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Speaker 1: bosses wouldn't give her a race, so she resigned from

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Speaker 1: the paper and wrote out her success, going on a

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Speaker 1: lecture tour and publishing the popular book Around the World

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Speaker 1: in seventy two days. A few months later, George Francis

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Speaker 1: train beat her record, coming in at sixty seven days.

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Speaker 1: But Nellie continued to write, and her sensational reporting left

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Speaker 1: an impact beyond the boundaries of stunt journalism. Oh and

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Speaker 1: if you think headlines today are super click baby check

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Speaker 1: out some of Nelly's headlines in the New York World.

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Speaker 1: One of the standouts is Nellie blithe tells how it

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Speaker 1: feels to be a white slave. I'm Eve step Coote

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Speaker 1: and hopefully you know a little more about history today

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Speaker 1: than you did yesterday. You can subscribe to This Day

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Speaker 1: in History Class on Apple Podcasts, the iHeart Radio app,

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Speaker 1: or wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks to Chandler Mays,

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Speaker 1: our producer. Come back tomorrow for another tip from history. Hi,

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Speaker 1: I'm Eves and you're listening to This Day in History Class,

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Speaker 1: a show that makes time travel a little bit easier.

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Speaker 1: The day was January nineteen four. The first ever Winter

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Speaker 1: Olympic Games began in Shamoni, France. Initially called the International

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Speaker 1: Winter Sports Week, the International Olympic Committee soon designated the

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Speaker 1: event the first Winter Olympics. The first modern Olympic Games

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Speaker 1: were held in Athens, Greece, in eight Just five years

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Speaker 1: after the First Olympics, the Swedish Central Association for the

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Speaker 1: Promotion of Sports launched the Nordic Games. The Nordic Games

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Speaker 1: were usually held in Stockholm, Sweden, and included athletes from

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Speaker 1: Nordic countries. The Games were held under the notion of

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Speaker 1: pan Nordic nationalism. They featured winter sports like downhill skiing,

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Speaker 1: ice hockey and skiing behind reindeer, as well as other

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Speaker 1: sports that weren't winter specific. But winter sports were creeping

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Speaker 1: into the Olympic Games. Figure skating was included in the

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Speaker 1: nineteen o eight Summer Olympics in London. When the Summer

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Speaker 1: Olympics were held in Stockholm in nineteen twelve, Sweden saw

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Speaker 1: to it that no winter sports would be included that

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Speaker 1: would pose a conflict with its Nordic Games, which were

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Speaker 1: pretty popular. Despite this, Germany planned to stage Winter Games

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Speaker 1: before the nineteen sixteen Summer Games set to take place

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Speaker 1: in the country, but those games were canceled because of

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Speaker 1: the outbreak of World War One. The Nordic Games, however,

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Speaker 1: pressed on Sweden, Denmark and Norway were neutral in the war.

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Speaker 1: Figure skating and ice hockey appeared in the nineteen twenty

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Speaker 1: Summer Games in Antwerp, Belgium. Two years later, the Nordic

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Speaker 1: Games featured a significant amount of non Swedish athletes for

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Speaker 1: the first time. But the Olympics were steadily gaining popularity

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Speaker 1: in members of the International Olympic Committee or IOC brought

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Speaker 1: up the idea of establishing a winter version of the

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Speaker 1: Olympic Games. Of course, Nordic countries opposed this idea for

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Speaker 1: the sake of their Nordic Games, but the IOC pressed

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Speaker 1: forward with plans to organize an international week of winter

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Speaker 1: sport that would be part of the nine Olympic Games

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Speaker 1: in Paris. In nine a congress planned out the competition's

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Speaker 1: calendar in sports, which included bob sleigh, curling, speed skating,

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Speaker 1: ski jumping, and other winter events. Shamoni mont Blanc was

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Speaker 1: chosen as the host for the Winter Games. At this point,

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Speaker 1: the competition was not sanctioned as an official Olympic Games.

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Speaker 1: Shamoni agreed to build certain facilities and maintain them, and

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Speaker 1: the French National Olympic Committee helped fund the creation of

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Speaker 1: the new facilities. The Winter Sports Week lasted from January

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Speaker 1: to February five of nineteen four, sixteen countries and around

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Speaker 1: two hundred and fifty eight athletes participated. Around ten thousand

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Speaker 1: people attended the competition. Women were only allowed to compete

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Speaker 1: in figure skating, and eleven of them did so. Norway

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Speaker 1: got the most medals, ending the week with seventeen, and

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Speaker 1: altogether the Nordic countries won the majority of the medals awarded.

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Speaker 1: The Winter Sports Week was deemed a success. Pierre Baron

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Speaker 1: de Couberton, founder of the IOC, praised the games in

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Speaker 1: a speech at the closing ceremony at its Prague Congress.

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Speaker 1: In May of nineteen, the IOC officially designated the week

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Speaker 1: as the First Olympic Winter Games. It also decided that

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Speaker 1: the host country of the Winter Games would be the

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Speaker 1: same as that of the corresponding Summer Games whenever possible.

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Speaker 1: The success of the First Winter Olympics affected the popularity

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Speaker 1: of the Nordic Games. The last games occurred in nineteen

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Speaker 1: Victor balk a leading figure in the creation of the games,

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Speaker 1: died in nineteen which also affected support for them. The

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Speaker 1: nineteen thirty Nordic Games were canceled due to weather. Then

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Speaker 1: World War Two came. The Nordic Games never returned. After

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Speaker 1: nine After Night, the Olympic Winter Games were held every

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Speaker 1: four years, the same year as the Summer Games. By

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Speaker 1: the nineteen nineties, the Winter and Summer Games were held

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Speaker 1: separately in alternating four year cycles. I'm Eve Jeff Cote

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Speaker 1: and hopefully you know a little more about history today

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Speaker 1: than you did yesterday. You can keep up with us

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Speaker 1: on social media on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. At t

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Speaker 1: d i h C Podcast And if you would like

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Speaker 1: to write me a letter, you can scan it, turn

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Speaker 1: it into a PDF, and send it to us via

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Speaker 1: email at this a at i heeartmedia dot com. Thanks

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Speaker 1: again for listening and we'll see you tomorrow