***YALSA AWARD FOR EXCELLENCE FINALIST 2015*** (Young Adult Library Services Association) Born in 1857 and raised in oil country, Ida M. Tarbell was one of the first investigative journalists and probably the most influential in her time. Working for McClure’s magazine, Tarbell wrote a series of articles on the Standard Oil Trust, a complicated business empire run by John D. Rockefeller.
Her articles revealed to the public the underhanded, even illegal dealings that had built Rockefeller’s empire and allowed it to prosper. Later termed muckrakers in a speech by Theodore Roosevelt-a term Tarbell disliked-she and her colleagues launched the practice of investigative journalism. Achieving remarkable professional success for a woman of her generation, Tarbell paradoxically declined to support the women’s suffrage movement, a stance that tarnished her reputation in later decades. This biography is an engrossing portrait of a complex woman, a trailblazer in a man’s world. Includes source notes, bibliography, and index. AGES: 12 up AUTHOR: Emily Arnold McCully is known primarily as an artist. The illustrator of more than forty books for young readers, she received the Caldecott Medal for ‘Mirette on the High Wire’. She is also passionate about history, particularly on feminist subjects, and makes her YA debut with this biography.