1936 – Sylvia Porter begins writing a personal finance column in the New York Post. She initially uses initials to disguise the fact that she’s a woman.
Porter graduated from Hunter College in 1932 and worked as an assistant in a Wall Street investment bank. Later, she wrote columns about bonds for American Banker for $2 apiece while publishing Reporting on Governments, a newsletter about government bond issues. Turned down by the Associated Press when she applied to be a business reporter, Porter was hired by the New York Post in 1936 and began writing a column with the title “S.F. Porter says.” The initials were intentional. The newspaper didn’t want its readers to know that it was a woman in her 20s offering thousands and thousands of people financial advice.
But Porter quickly gained a following. Her explanation of arcane financial subjects such as government bonds and term life insurance was done in a way that everyone could understand the point she was trying to get across. In that respect, she was one of the first business journalists to write in layman’s terms rather than Wall Street’s terminology. In addition, she began her writing at a time when the Depression had caused virtually everyone to be more cautious with their hard-earned money.
By the 1940s, Porter’s column used her full name as well as her picture. Porter’s column covered financial issues other than investment advice. Her Feb. 28, 1947 column in the Post focused on consumer opinion long before consumer confidence was measured on a monthly basis. Porter’s May 22, 1947 column tackled the decline in individual savings, which she blamed on higher prices. On July 3, 1947 , she wrote about how consumers were dipping into savings to make purchases.
But her forte was investing. At the same time she was writing columns assessing the nation’s economy, Porter was also dispensing investment advice. Her March 20, 1947 column discussed a new savings bond from the federal government. Her May 7, 1947 column was about money that the government owed consumers who had not cashed in expired savings bonds. Her May 20, 1947 column noted that stocks valued at less than $10 appeared to be outperforming higher-priced issues. And her July 15, 1947 column addressed the issue of what bonds to purchase for different investors.
Porter also wrote about investing as it related to companies. She recalled going to financial meetings dressed in her “Kitty Foyle dresses with little white collars and little white cuffs and looking oh, so innocent.” The businessmen would discuss financial issues that they didn’t think she’d understand, but then they would read about them the next day in the Post. Once, she attended a convention of investment bankers and overheard a group of them discussing secret negotiations about an upcoming sale of Ford Motor Co. stock. The bankers had thought she was one of the wives and then wondered how the story made it into the Post.