Polly Pry: The Woman Who Wrote the West

by Julia Bricklin

In 1900, the young and beautiful Leonel Ross Campbell became the first female reporter to work for the Denver Post. As the journalist known as Polly Pry, she ruffled feathers when she worked to free a convicted cannibal and when she battled the powerful Telluride miners’ union. She was nearly murdered more than once. And a younger female colleague once said, “Polly Pry did not just report the news, she made it!”
If only that young reporter had known how true her words were. Polly Pry got her start not just writing the news but inventing it. In spite of herself, however, Campbell would become a respected journalist and activist later in her career. She would establish herself as a champion for rights of the under served in the early twentieth century, taking up the causes of women, children, laborers, victims and soldiers of war, and prisoners. And she wrote some of the most sensational stories that westerners had ever read, all while keeping the truth behind her success a secret from her colleagues and closest friends and family.

Genres: Biography, Journalism, Nonfiction, History

216 pages, Hardcover

First published September 1, 2018

Reviews

[Katya Cengel · Rating 5 out of 5]

As a female journalist and journalism professor I consider this book required reading. While I can name a number of contemporary male journalists, I am embarrassed to say that before I read this book I could not name a single historical female journalist. The big male names from the past are referenced all the time, but not the female. Polly Pry may not have practiced journalism according to today's standards, but that is because she lived during a different time when journalism meant a different thing. Bricklin does a great job of telling this story as a reporter would, honestly with the needed historical and cultural context. The author's own journalism background is evident in the way she chooses to tell Polly Pry's story in full, letting readers see the good and the bad and draw their own conclusions.

My favorite line comes at the very beginning: "Above all, Polly Pry showed that a woman wielding a pen could shape the West as well as any man holding a gun".

A much needed historical perspective that anyone interested in journalism today (and in my very biased opinion that should be the entire population due to the current importance of the topic) should consider a must read.

[Pat Wahler · Rating 5 out of 5]

Although I’d heard the name “Polly Pry” before, I knew nothing about her, so I was pleased to see that Julia Bricklin had crafted an absorbing biography of the “woman who wrote the west”.

From a humble start as a farmer’s daughter, Nell Campbell exhibited early on a daring nature, which included orchestrating an escape from boarding school. She utilized this characteristic often in what would later become her career – journalism.

Fascinated by political and social issues, Nell put a face on stories, and moved readers with vivid scenes and impassioned words. Unfortunately, in the beginning not all the words were necessarily true. Yet Nell certainly gained an audience. In the words of the author, “Nell, alias, Polly Pry, became an adventuress, labor activist, suffragette, and dramatist, and above all, a woman who did not let danger get in the way of a good story.”

I thoroughly enjoyed this book, and highly recommend it for any reader who wants to know more about what it took to be a female journalist in the 19th century.

[Senator · Rating 2 out of 5]

I've had to think long a hard about this review, and sadly this book just doesn't come up to snuff. Polly Pry sounded like a pretty badass lady in her day, but whoa. This book read like a textbook. Way too much information without enough anecdotes breaking up the mind numbing facts.
Great information, not so great execution.

[J R · Rating 5 out of 5]

Met the author at a lecture she gave at Malaga Cove Library and decided to buy her book. Quick great read indeed.

[Plum · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great biography of a forgotten journalist of the West.

[D'Arcy Cornwall · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great read about an amazing time in history. I did not know anything about Polly Pry. Throughout the book, I kept changing my mind from liking her to thinking she was a fraud back to liking her again. The characters Polly runs into from the cannibal (loved that piece of history) to Tom Horn to Pancho Villa (I think that she lied about this one), kept me interested and turning the pages to see what else this lady could get herself mixed up in. I highly recommend this book and am looking forward to reading Julia Bricklin’s next book, Blonde Rattlesnake...love that title!