Covering The Spanish-American War in Cuba
During the Spanish-American War of 1898, Kathleen Blake volunteered to go to Cuba to cover the battle activity at the front. The Toronto Mail sent her to Cuba, exploiting the opportunity to garner sensationalist publicity. However, she was told by her supervisors to write features and “guff,” as she called it, not the news from the front, apparently believing that this would not be appropriate for a woman. She received her war correspondent accreditation from the United States government, thus becoming the first accredited woman war correspondent in the world.
She was authorized to accompany American troops, but was vehemently opposed by other correspondents and the military authorities, who nearly succeeded in keeping her stranded in Florida. Blake persevered and arrived in Cuba in July 1898, just before the end of the war. Her accounts of the aftermath of the war and of its human casualties were the peak of her journalism career and made her famous. On her way back to Canada, Kathleen stopped in Washington where she addressed the International Press Union of Women Journalists.
Read more about this topic: Kit Coleman
Famous quotes containing the words covering the, covering, war and/or cuba:
“You had to have seen the corpses lying there in front of the school—the men with their caps covering their faces—to know the meaning of class hatred and the spirit of revenge.”
—Alfred Döblin (1878–1957)
“You had to have seen the corpses lying there in front of the school—the men with their caps covering their faces—to know the meaning of class hatred and the spirit of revenge.”
—Alfred Döblin (1878–1957)
“We are constantly thinking of the great war ... which saved the Union ... but it was a war that did a great deal more than that. It created in this country what had never existed before—a national consciousness. It was not the salvation of the Union, it was the rebirth of the Union.”
—Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924)
“Education is a necessity, it helps to understand life. Like that compagnero in Cuba who talked about politics, back when they were on strike. He knew many things, that hijo de puta, and he unraveled the most confusing situations in a marvelous way. You could see each point in front of you on the line of his reasoning like rinsed laundry set up to dry; he explained things to you so clearly that you could grasp it like a good hunk of bread with your hand.”
—Jacques Roumain (1907–1945)