Beth Campbell Short

She was a reporter for the Springfield Leader and The Daily Oklahoman, before joining the Associated Press as a correspondent in its Washington, D.C. bureau.

While there, she covered the First Lady, Eleanor Roosevelt, and met her future husband, Joseph Short, a fellow reporter at the paper and later press secretary for President Harry S. Truman.

She was the publicity director for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and press secretary for Senator Mike Monroney.

She wrote on a range of topics in her column, titled 'The Very Idea' – including a report on the Young Brothers massacre in 1932, a series on her efforts to live on $2.50 (equivalent to $46 in 2023) for ten days and a criticism of the sermons delivered by local pastors.

[1] She was the only woman at the Washington bureau for the AP, out of eighty-nine staff members, taking over for Bess Furman in the position.

[1][3] She was hired as the press secretary for Mike Monroney, a Democratic senator from Oklahoma, serving between 1957 and 1966.