The Case of Martha Grinder
Cases from history are often hard to research properly. Sure, we are able to access many old newspapers from the times, as we have for many years through things like microfilm and what not, but the problem lies in the newspaper accounts themselves. Actually in all truthfulness, newspapers should not be isolated as being the only source that was unreliable. I am certain that books of the time, as well as the infamous 'murder pamphlets' as they were called, recalling crimes, also fall into this category. I have mentioned before in previous blogs about what was known as 'yellow journalism.' To put this in a type of modern terms it could be equated with The National Enquirer or even movies based on true events. Things were not just exaggerated but often flat out fabrications in order to make the story more interesting. Today true journalism, at least when it comes to newspapers are generally more reliable than they were back in the mid-l...