To win a £20,000 wager Phileas Fogg, cucumbrous hero of Novelist Jules Verne's best seller, circled the globe in 80 days. This fictive feat remained a record until 1889, when the late Publisher Joseph Pulitzer, casting about for a circulation-getter, ordered 22-year-old Nellie Ely to "knock about five days off this fellow Phileas Fogg's record." Globe-girdler Bly, bloomered and veiled, sailed from Hoboken, N. J. on a bow-spritted ocean greyhound, completed her stint in 72¼ days.
Since Nellie Ely's day, the record has changed hands as often as wrestling titles.
First to round the...
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