ABSTRACT
The content of newspapers published in the 1890s both reflected and influenced public opinion of lynching. Newspaper accounts have been the primary source for studying the phenomenon since at least the early 1890s, when Ida B. Wells used newspaper reports and records of lynchings compiled by the Chicago Tribune to investigate mob law. In "Southern Horrors," Wells referred to the Port Jervis lynching in her criticism of the mainstream press. When Wells implied that white women willingly participated in relationships with black men, she struck a raw nerve among whites in Memphis. Wells's English tour led to speaking invitations in various US cities, and she embarked on a lecture circuit in the United States. Wells attributed the decline in the number of lynchings, which began in 1893, as evidence of the impact that the US press had on public opinion.
