Geography of Rape Coverage
Of the 30 selected stories about rape published in The Wheeling Daily Intelligencer in 1880 and 1900, 13 occurred in the state of West Virginia and 17 occurred out-of-state, including one story concerning the Philippines. In 1880, 11 of the selected rape stories occurred out-of-state, while only 2 stories occurred in West Virginia. By 1900, however, the majority of the selected stories occurred in-state, with 11 total, while 6 out-of state stories were still reported including the Philippines story.
Most of the out-of-state stories concerned hanging executions, lynchings, and mob violence. The farthest story, besides the story from the Philippines, was about a shooting at a rape trial in Lemars, Iowa. A couple of the out-of-state stories concern the region right across the Ohio border near Wheeling, so they could be considered more local. The in-state stories focus on cases concerning local cases where the people involved are more often named and generally have less to do with race. 5 of the 13 total in-state stories involved local cases from Wheeling.
The average word length of the 13 in-state stories was about 310 words, while the average word length of the 17 out-of-state stories was only about 161 words. This suggests that there were a greater number of lengthier stories at the local level because readers would want more details about cases closer to home.