Winifred Bonfils

Winifred Sweet Black Bonfils (October 14, 1863, Chilton, Wisconsin – May 25, 1936, San Francisco, California) was an American reporter and columnist, under the pen name Annie Laurie, a reference to her mother's favorite lullaby. She also wrote under the name Winifred Black.

Career Bonfils, as Winifred Black and as Annie Laurie, wrote celebrity and sensational articles, the kind sought after by William Randolph Hearst's news syndicate, and for the San Francisco Examiner. She was one of the most prominent "sob sisters", a label given female reporters who wrote human interest stories. Her stories often contained baseless statistics and lurid headlines especially with regard to drug use. Her first husband was Orlow Black, and her second was publisher Charles Bonfils.

After writing to the Chicago Tribune, in 1890 she found work at the San Francisco Examiner. She was a reporter, telegraph editor, Sunday editor, assistant city editor, special writer. She investigated the leper settlement in Molokai, Hawaii, in 1892. She raised funds for founding several charities. She investigated the public hospitals in San Francisco and those inaugurating many reforms. She helped found Junior Republic for Boys in New York. She conducted California Children's Excursion to World's Fair in Chicago. She managed hospitals and relief work for Galveston flood victims. She organized and managed the national and international fight against narcotic evil.

She reported from Europe during the First World War, later becoming a columnist.

She wrote a biography of Phoebe Apperson Hearst, The Life and Personality of Phoebe Apperson Hearst. she was the daughter of Civil War General Benjamin Sweet and Lovisa Denslow, and the sister of Ada Celeste Sweet, who held the first position as disbursing officer ever given to a woman by the US government.

Winifred grew up on a farm in Lombard, Illinois, attending a number of private schools in the Chicago area. After attempting a career as an actress, became a journalist, writing for a short time in Chicago before landing a job at the San Francisco Examiner in 1890. After the divorce she moved to Denver, Colorado. In the late 1920s she was back to California, living at 37 Florence St., San Francisco, California, and married to Charles A. Bonfils, brother of Frederick Gilmer Bonfils. They had two children, Winifred Bonfils Barker, who married C. O. Barker, and Eugene Napoleon Bonfils, who died young. Bonfils died. The announcement in The San Bernardino Daily Sun reported:

Her funeral was a civic ceremony in San Francisco, with her body lying in state in the City Hall. She was buried at Holy Cross Cemetery in Colma, California.