[2] While attending Idaho Falls High School, Clark participated in the debate club and student government.
While attending Boise High School, Bethine met junior Frank Church and they became close friends.
After a year at Stanford, Church enlisted in the military in 1943, and served as a U.S. Army intelligence officer in China, Burma, and India during World War II.
While he was undergoing cancer treatments, the couple welcomed their first child Frank Forrester IV in 1948 on September 23.
The following year the family moved to Washington, D.C. and adopted a son and named him Chase Clark Church.
Coming from a very politically involved and powerful family, Bethine Church was a natural for a career in public service.
[8] Church knew she didn't fit into the classic mold for a politician's wife: "I have often described my life in Washington as like Cinderella's—I was either cleaning the fireplace or going to the ball.