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Nov. 1, 2013 — Allegheny College will celebrate pioneering journalist Ida Tarbell’s birthday from noon to 1 p.m. on Tuesday, November 5 in the lobby of the Tippie Alumni Center in Cochran Hall. The public is invited for cake and a short presentation.

Speaking at the event will be Professor of English Ben Slote, who has written a play about Ida Tarbell that will be presented at Allegheny in the spring; Cheryl Hatch, career photojournalist and visiting assistant professor in the college’s new Journalism in the Public Interest program; and Mary Spicer, a journalist with The Meadville Tribune.

Tarbell was born in Erie County in 1857 and grew up in Titusville. The only woman in Allegheny’s Class of 1880, Tarbell set a standard for investigative reporting that journalists today continue to hold high. She is best known for her 1904 book “The History of the Standard Oil Company,” in which she revealed the unethical means used by John D. Rockefeller to monopolize the early oil industry. Eight years later, as a result of Tarbell’s investigative work, the Supreme Court issued a decision to break up the Standard Oil trust.

In 1999 the New York University journalism department ranked “The History of the Standard Oil Company” fifth in a listing of the top 100 journalistic works of the 20th century.

Tarbell served as a trustee of Allegheny College for many years. The Ida M. Tarbell Collection at Allegheny College contains her professional papers and book collection.