Agness May Underwood (née Wilson; December 17, 1902 – July 3, 1984) was an American journalist and newspaper editor and one of the first women in the United States to hold a city editorship on a major metropolitan daily.

Underwood recalled that she and her sister did not stay in Terre Haute and that they moved frequently, often winding up in the hands of public charity.

[3][5] Underwood arrived in San Francisco in November 1918, and moved in with her relative who lived in an apartment on Geary Street.

After a few frustrating days of unsuccessful job hunting, she arrived at the apartment only to discover that her relative had moved out leaving Underwood broke, alone, and homeless.

[3] Underwood became a resident at the Salvation Army's home for working women in downtown Los Angeles and got a job at the Broadway Department Store.

The day following the stockings argument Underwood's friend, Evelyn Connors, called and asked her if she would be interested in a temporary job on the switchboard at the Record.

She assisted Gertrude Price, who wrote a woman's column under the pseudonym of Cynthia Grey, in the Christmas basket program for the poor.

[3] Underwood worked her way up to reporter at the Record, and her first byline was an interview with an elderly man who was credited with having planted the first cotton in California.

[3] Underwood's first major crime reporting began on May 20, 1931, when Los Angeles was shaken by the murders of Charles H. Crawford and Herbert F. Spencer.

In addition, she felt that she was gaining valuable experience in every aspect of the newspaper business at the perennially short-staffed Record, and she worried that she would be more constricted at the Herald-Express.

She had decided to decline the offer when a couple of days later she learned that the Record had been sold to the Illustrated Daily News.

Three weeks after she began working at the Herald-Express, Underwood drew photographer Perry Fowler for a story on the rape of a sixteen-year-old girl.

Among the stories Underwood covered over the next twelve years were the untimely deaths of Hollywood stars Thelma Todd (whose autopsy she attended) and Jean Harlow.

Underwood stated in her autobiography, Newspaperwoman, that the popularization of Short's "Black Dahlia" nickname was the result of information she had received from a Los Angeles Police Department homicide detective.

[3] In the midst of reporting on the Black Dahlia case, Underwood was promoted to city editor of the Herald-Express.

[3][5] Wielding a sawed-off baseball bat and a starter pistol, Underwood ran a staff of hard-nosed reporters and photographers who called her "Aggie" (the nickname she had acquired while working at the Record) until her retirement in 1968.

[7] On April 22, 1981, Underwood's attorney, Caryl Warner, filed a $110 million defamation lawsuit against author Ovid Demaris and publisher Times Books over a passage in The Last Mafioso.

According to Fratianno, Cohen had pocketed $1 million from contributors to the Israeli cause by planting a false story in the Herald-Express stating that the ship carrying the money had gone down at sea.

The way I see it, Mickey called her and made up a story about buying guns and ammunition for the Jews and told her the boat sank.

In 1981, and in failing health, Underwood moved from Los Angeles to Greeley, Colorado, to live near her son and grandchildren.

As editor, she knew the names and telephone numbers of numerous celebrities, in addition to all the bars her reporters frequented.

"[4] Underwood is buried at Forest Lawn Memorial Park, Glendale, California, in the Court of Freedom, Sanctuary of Affection, crypt 1239.