Nellie Bly was the first investigative reporter. She had famously masqueraded as a mentally ill woman to go undercover in an insane asylum for ten days, among other sensational stunts for the New York World newspaper. By 1889, she was the most famous female reporter in the U.S., but her popularity was waning due to competition from other “stunt girls”. So she proposed a trip around the world to beat the fictional record set by Jules Vernes’ Phileas Fogg in his 1873 novel “Around the World in Eighty Days”. At first, her editor was appalled by the idea of an unchaperoned woman travelling alone and thought a man should do it instead. When Nellie told him to go ahead and she would make the trip for another newspaper, he backed down. She left on Nov. 14, 1889 on the steamer “Augusta Victoria”, carrying one suitcase containing underwear, a dressing gown, a tennis blazer, slippers, three veils, and assorted items. The 25-year old fought off seasickness and arrived in London in seven days. A stop in Amiens, France was not on the itinerary, but she could not pass up an invitation from Jules Verne. They had a nice visit and he wished her well. It was then on to Italy and through the Suez Canal. Along the way she sent short dispatches by cable and longer stories by ship. She wrote about Japanese fashion, Italian cuisine, and Egyptian alligator-hunting. In Hong Kong (where she bought a monkey), she learned that she was in a race with Elizabeth Bisland. Bisland was the literary editor for Cosmopolitan magazine. Bisland had been strong-armed into setting off in the opposite direction from New York City the same day Nellie left. Bly was not fazed. From Japan, she sailed to San Francisco where her newspaper had a single car train ready to whisk her across the country. She was greeted by cheering crowds along the way. Arriving on Jan. 25, 1890, she had been gone 72 hours, 6 hours, 11 minutes, and 16 seconds. She beat Bisland by four days. She had covered 24,899 miles and proved a feisty female could beat a fictional man.
https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/52745/nellie-blys-72-day-trip-around-world
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Around_the_World_in_Seventy-Two_Days
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