Mazie E. Clemens
Mazie E. Clemens was an American journalist who served as Special Representative of the National Catholic War Council during World War I. Walter Winchell counted her among the "Daredevil Angels of the Press" in his 1950 list of outstanding women journalists.
Early life
Mazie E. Clemens was the daughter of Richard Clemens and Ellen Clemens of New York. She was sometimes described as a relative of Mark Twain's.Career
Clemens worked as a librarian and reporter at the New York World newspaper before World War I, and a war correspondent for the Philadelphia Public Ledger. She was Special Representative of the National Catholic War Council, working in Europe, during and after World War I. She interviewed Catholic leaders including Marechal Foch, Cardinal Amette, and Elisabeth of Bavaria, for the organization's published bulletin. In late 1919 she disguised herself as an Italian peasant to carry supplies into Fiume, across a blockade. "I wore a blue cotton dress and a gray woolen shawl furnished by the family of an Italian naval officer with connections in New York City," she explained afterwards; "Within a few yards of the city I found myself a woman alone. The entire town, especially around the railroad station, seemed to be one mass of soldiers, but I managed to elude them."After the war, she covered scandals and murder investigations, and testified in criminal trials. Walter Winchell counted her among the "Daredevil Angels of the Press" in his 1950 list of outstanding women journalists.
In later years, she worked as a Deputy Commissioner of Corrections for the State of New York, overseeing the prison commissary at Welfare Island. She was also an auditor for the state's Bureau of Internal Revenue. She was also "official biographer" of Patrick Joseph Hayes, an American cardinal and Archbishop of New York.