Betty Knox

[4] After several years working as a chorus girl in vaudeville, Knox met Liverpudlian Jack Wilson and Irishman Joe Keppel, a clog dancing double act.

Over the next couple of years, they tried out various new routines, before coming up with the idea of wearing Egyptian costumes and performing eccentric dancing in a comic imitation of hieroglyphic wall paintings.

'[5] In addition to helping to devise new routines for Wilson, Keppel and Betty, Knox also scripted sketches and lyrics for several other variety acts, particularly Tessie O'Shea, for whom she wrote one of her most successful wartime songs, International Rhythm.

[7][8][9] Although she was totally untrained in the profession, editor Frank Owen was impressed by her extensive knowledge of Britain and the British, gained by her natural curiosity and her non-stop touring lifestyle.

Her first column featured an interview with novelist John Steinbeck,[11] who had recently returned from Capri where he was war correspondent with the United States Navy.

Her columns were peppered with humorous anecdotes and American slang, and frequently poked fun at the inability of the British to make a proper cup of coffee.

[18] The following year, in July 1947, an article Knox wrote for the London Evening Standard, claiming that escaped Nazi war criminal Martin Bormann was alive and living in Russia, provoked interest from MI5.