Elizabeth Fowler, Workplace Editor Who Championed Women, Dies at 95

September 3, 2014 – Elizabeth M. Fowler, an author and financial reporter for The New York Times and one of the first women to cover the Wall Street beat for a daily newspaper, died on August 11 at her home in Chatham, NJ. She was 95. Ms. Fowler was a copy editor with The Wall Street Journal when she joined the Times’ all-male staff in 1956. Over the next 36 years she carved out a unique niche and developed a trademark style that would help to demystify the clubby world of money. But it was her writing on women in the workplace that set Ms. Fowler apart; she provided a well-needed “shot in the arm” for females seeking more substantial careers. She profiled women in back-office jobs at financial institutions, including secretaries, typists and switchboard operators. Ms. Fowler also explained how the income tax system penalized working wives and spotlighted the rare cases in the postwar years when women had risen to executive positions. “Although Scott Scanlon, myself and others at HSZ Media have been quoted many times in the mainstream media over 25 years, our very first entry was in Ms. Fowler’s “Careers” column in January 1990,” said Christopher W. Hunt, HSZ Media’s president. “We were always grateful to Elizabeth for taking a chance on two young men who had just launched the industry’s new newsletter, Executive Search Review, in October 1989. She opened a big door for us and continued to advise us during the early years of our company.”

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