Julius Chambers

Julius Chambers, F.R.G.S., (November 21, 1850 – February 12, 1920) was an American author, editor, journalist, travel writer, and activist against psychiatric abuse.
Life and works
Julius Chambers was born in Bellefontaine, Ohio on November 21, 1850, the son of Joseph and Sarabella (née Walker) Chambers. When he was only eleven years old, he began working as a printer's devil in his uncles' newspaper office, the Bellefontaine Republican. He first attended Ohio Wesleyan University, and later, Cornell University, from which he graduated in 1870. At Cornell, he was a co-founder in 1869 of the Irving Literary Society. Around 1880, while working as a journalist he spent some time reading law in Philadelphia with Benjamin H. Brewster, who became U.S. Attorney General in December 1881, and studying at Columbia College Law School in New York City.
New York Tribune
After graduating from Cornell, he became a reporter on the New York Tribune until 1873.
Geographic discovery
While on sick leave on June 4, 1872, Chambers discovered Elk Lake adjoining Lake Itasca in Clearwater County, Minnesota, in the Lake District of Northwestern Minnesota. He declared it to be the ultimate origin of the Mississippi River. For this discovery, he was made a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society. This led to a series of newspaper articles and the book The Mississippi River and Its Wonderful Valley (1910).
Investigative journalism
Later in 1872, he returned to work and undertook a journalistic investigation of Bloomingdale Asylum, having himself committed with the help of some of his friends and the city editor. His intent was to obtain information about alleged abuse of inmates. After ten days, his collaborators on the project had him released. When articles and accounts of the experience were published in the Tribune, it led to the release of twelve patients who were not mentally ill, a reorganization of the staff and administration of the institution and, eventually, to a change in the lunacy laws. This later led to the publication of the book A Mad World and Its People (1876). From this time onward, Chambers was frequently invited to speak on the rights of the mentally ill and the need for proper facilities for their accommodation, care and treatment.
New York Herald
In 1873, he joined the staff of the New York Herald and in his fifteen years at the newspaper occupied nearly every one of its editorial desks. In 1887, his editor-in-chief sent him to Paris to launch the Paris Herald.
New York World
In 1889, Chambers became the managing editor of the New York World on the invitation of Joseph Pulitzer, where he remained until 1891.
In 1890, Pulitzer, Chambers, et al. were indicted for posthumous criminal libel against Alexander T. Stewart for accusing him of "a dark and secret crime", as the man who "invited guests to meet his mistresses at his table", and as "a pirate of the dry goods ocean." The charges were dismissed by the court. This sort of criminal action was common at the time and both Pulitzer and Chambers were indicted in a number of cases, in some of which they were acquitted, in others convicted.
Chambers also wrote a column for the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, from 1904 onwards, called "Walks and Talks" and he continued to write it for the rest of his life.
He continued his travel writing and lectured in journalism at Cornell University from 1903 to 1904, and at New York University in 1910.
In addition to his works of non-fiction, he published over a hundred short stories and had two plays produced in New York, both comedies. His final book, the posthumously published News Hunting on Three Continents (1921), has been generally accepted as an autobiographical account of his career even though many of the chapters are in fact lightly revised versions of fictional stories he wrote over the years.
Chambers was married twice. For years he was a member of the Lotos Club, New York.
He died at his home in New York on February 12, 1920.
Bibliography
Books
A Mad World and Its People (1876) a.k.a. A Mad World and Its Inhabitants, Sampson Low, Marston, Searle, & Rivington, London
On a Margin (1884) The story of a hopeless patriot, Ford, Howard & Hulbert, New York
Lovers Four and Maidens Five (1886) A story of the Allegheny Mountains, Porter & Coates
Missing (1896) A Romance of the Sargasso Sea, The Transatlantic Publishing Company
A Happy Month in Jamaica (1900) F. Presbrey Co.
The Destiny of Doris (1901) A travel-story of three continents, Continental Publishing Company, New York
Seven, Seven, Seven – City (1903) A Tale of the Telephone, featuring female sleuth Mrs. Edith Marchmont
When Money Talked (1904) Serialized in The Gateway: (Part 1) (Part 2)
Seeing New York (1908) a brief historical guide and souvenir of America's greatest city
The Book of New York (1912) Forty years' recollections of the American metropolis
Montreal (1915) Old, New, Entertaining, Convincing, Fascinating (contributing editor)
News Hunting on Three Continents (1921) Mitchell Kennerley, New York
The Rascal Club (1897) F. Tennyson Neely, New York.
Benjamin North
One Woman's Life
News hunting on three continents. Publisher: Mitchell Kennerley, New York 1921
Articles
"The Chivalry of the Press" The Arena Vol.4 (June, 1891
"Little Stories of Journalism" in The Reader (1904)
"Woman:The Line of Progress" (1910) in The Forum, Volume 44
"Why Germany Went to War, General Conversion to the Racial Doctrines of Professor Fichte" in The Gateway, a magazine of patriotic service, Volume XXXI (1918)
Notes
References
American male journalists
American travel writers
Fellows of the Royal Geographical Society
1850 births
1920 deaths
Cornell University alumni
New York Herald people
People from Bellefontaine, Ohio
Journalists from Ohio