May Birkhead

May Rule Birkhead (1882–1941) was an American fashion and society reporter who reported from Paris between 1913 and 1941. She wrote primarily for the Paris editions of the ''New York Herald'' and the ''Chicago Tribune'', and also contributed to the ''New York Times'' and as a radio correspondent for ''NBC News.''

Birkhead launched her career as a journalist when, as a passenger on the RMS ''Carpathia'', the ship came to the sinking ''Titanic'''s rescue in 1912. She gathered extensive accounts of ''Titanic'' passengers' experiences for the ''New York Herald'', and was shortly thereafter offered a position at the ''Herald'''s Paris newspaper, commonly known as the ''Paris Herald''. Birkhead's reporting on American society in Europe drew so much attention that she was at one point referred to as "the society empress of the American press in Europe".

Biography

May Rule Birkhead was born in 1882 in Louisiana, Missouri, north of St. Louis. Her father was a dentist, and her mother came from a family with long Missouri roots. The family was close friends with that of James Beauchamp "Champ" Clark.

Birkhead was embarking on her first visit to Europe when she had her encounter with the ''Titanic'', and after the '' Carpathia'' returned the ''Titanic'''s survivors to New York, she reembarked for Paris, arriving in 1912. She resided in Paris from 1912 until 1940, when she fled the Nazi-occupied city.

She died in New York in 1941, following "a long illness".

Career

Birkhead's amateur reporting on the ''Titanic'' disaster so impressed James Gordon Bennett, Jr - owner of the ''New York Herald'' and the ''Paris Herald'' - that when she arrived in Paris in 1912 he immediately offered her a job as society columnist for the paper. She reported on the activities of Americans not just in Paris, but in the French Riviera and other popular destinations for Anglophone residents and visitors across Europe.

When World War I began, Birkhead began covering the activities of General Pershing, her fellow Missourian, for the paper, as well as becoming one of the few female reporters to visit battlefields (albeit after the armistice). After the war she returned to reporting on fashion and society news.

In 1926, Birkhead left the ''Paris Herald'' to become a society columnist for the ''Herald's'' rival Paris American newspaper: the '' Paris Tribune''. At the ''Tribune'', Birkhead's column appeared on the front page of the paper six days a week, until the newspaper was bought by the ''Herald'' in 1934, becoming the ''International Herald Tribune''. After this she wrote as a special correspondent for the ''New York Times'', and a radio correspondent for ''NBC radio''.

Birkhead retains a reputation as one of the most famous society columnists of all time—appearing as one of only five society columnists named in the ''Encyclopedia of American Journalisms list that spans two centuries.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Birkhead, May
1882 births
1941 deaths
20th-century American women journalists
20th-century American journalists
20th-century American women writers
American expatriates in France
Journalists from Missouri
People from Louisiana, Missouri
RMS Titanic