Could a woman walk around the world today?
Women adventurers reveal how gender inequality can limit movement—and imagination.
The editor replied that it was impossible: She’d need a chaperone, she would carry too much baggage, she spoke only English—and besides, only a man could make such a journey.
Bly replied, “Start the man, and I'll start the same day for some other newspaper and beat him."
The paper was Joseph Pulitzer’s New York World, and they did, eventually, send Bly around the globe. She traveled alone, wore one dress, carried gold in her pocket and pound notes in a pouch around her neck, and packed a single handbag. (It contained toiletries, underwear, handkerchiefs, needle and thread, paper and pens, a drinking cup, and a jar of cold cream.) She sailed from Hoboken toward London, and 72 days, 6 hours, and
