(1889-1967)
The first female journalist accredited by the U.S. War Department and a founder of the Overseas Press Club. Henrietta Eleanor Good-nough was born in Kansas in 1889. An active child who always wanted to be somebody, Good-nough started her journalism career in Junction City, Kansas. She next worked in Denver, San Francisco, and Hawaii. She later moved to Minneapolis, changing her byline at this time to Peggy Hull.
In 1916, Hull moved to Cleveland to write an advertising column while running a shopping service. Wishing to report on the activities of the Ohio National Guard, she joined the Women’s Auxiliary of the Guard when General John J. Pershing and his troops were being sent to the Mexican border. Hull traveled to Texas ahead of the unit as a freelancer and simultaneously pursued a busy social life. Once in Texas, she was hired by an El Paso newspaper. She accompanied the 20,000 men of the Tenth Division on a fifteen-day march in New Mexico, and in February 1917 she rode out to meet the soldiers, managing to be filmed riding with Pershing at the head of troops.
When the United States entered World War I in April 1917, the El Paso Morning Times agreed to send her to France, but the War Department did not consider the paper large enough to warrant an accredited reporter. She sailed anyway in June 1917, writing stories on her experiences while her acquaintance with Pershing helped her get access to the troops. As the articles she sent back to the United States gained popularity, other reporters complained, and she was recalled. In the summer of 1918, she was accredited and authorized to travel with the American Expeditionary Forces to Siberia, sponsored by the Newspaper Enterprise Association (NEA) and the Cleveland (Ohio) Press.
Peggy Hull.
Next Hull worked in Shanghai and was there in January 1932 when the city was attacked by the Japanese. She wrote about the Japanese attack on China for the New York Daily News. She was again accredited during World War II for the Pacific theater reporting from Hawaii, Guam, and other islands. She was awarded the U.S. Navy Commendation for her service writing about the ordinary day-to-day lives of the soldiers.
Hull was married to George Hull, John Kin-ley, and Harvey Deuell; the first two marriages ended in divorce and the third with the death of Deuell. She spent the last several years of her life in California and died of breast cancer on June 19, 1967.
