44 Facts About Agness Underwood

Agness Underwood was preceded by Laura Vitray who became city editor of the New York Evening Graphic in 1930 and by Mary Holland Kinkaid who was city editor at the old Herald, likely in the early 1900s.

Agness Underwood worked as a reporter for the Los Angeles Record from 1928 to 1935, the Herald-Express from 1935 to 1962 and the Herald-Examiner from 1962 to 1968.

Agness 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.

Agness Underwood's sister was sent to live with a farm family.

Agness Underwood later described the Ewry household as a serious environment, made bearable only by Ralph's kindness.

Agness Underwood did well in school and skipped three grades; however, by the time she entered high school in 1916 her enthusiasm for her studies had waned and she dropped out in the tenth grade.

Agness Underwood took as job as a clerk in the basement of Cartwright's department store in Portland, Indiana.

Agness Underwood became increasingly unhappy living with the Ewrys, particularly following Ralph's deployment overseas as a soldier during World War I Ralph sensed Underwood's discontent in her letters to him and, believing that she might be better off with a blood relative, managed to locate one of her distant relatives in San Francisco.

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

Agness Underwood knew she would be expected to contribute to household expenses and set out to find a job.

Agness 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.

One of the small economies that Agness Underwood practiced was to wear her sister's hand-me-down silk stockings.

One day Agness Underwood asked her husband for the money to buy a new pair of stockings, but he demurred.

An argument ensued and Agness Underwood told her husband that if he would not give her money for stockings, she would get a job and earn them herself.

Agness Underwood seized the opportunity, and thus began her career in the newspaper business.

In October 1926, Agness Underwood began her job as the switchboard operator at the Los Angeles Record.

Agness Underwood was a quick study and worked hard at any task to which she was assigned.

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

Hickman was on the run when Agness Underwood saw the United Press flash that he had been captured in Oregon.

Price overheard the call and reprimanded Agness Underwood for talking about a story outside of the newsroom before it was in print.

Agness 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.

Agness Underwood had noticed a couple of gaps in the coverage of the murders.

Agness Underwood thought it odd that no one had interviewed Clark's parents.

Agness Underwood managed to locate them and they gave her an exclusive interview and photographs.

Agness Underwood was given an increasing number of major stories to cover for the Record, and her reputation as a reporter grew.

Agness Underwood was offered a job at William Randolph Hearst's Herald-Express, but she turned it down.

Agness Underwood 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.

Agness Underwood staked out Earhart's North Hollywood home for several hours before she turned up.

The interview was worth the wait; Agness Underwood discovered that she was the only Herald-Express reporter who had caught up with Earhart.

Agness Underwood wrote a series of articles on the lives of the women incarcerated in the California women's prison at Tehachapi, and she would report on nearly every major murder case in the city, culminating with the infamous murder of twenty-two-year-old Elizabeth Short in January 1947.

Agness Underwood reported on the case of Nellie May Madison who was convicted of shooting and killing her husband on March 24,1935.

At first Agness Underwood assumed Madison was guilty because she was married five times and produced no children from the marriage.

Agness Underwood eventually became an advocate for Madison and garnered outcry of letters which had Madison's conviction from death to life in prison.

Agness 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.

Agness Underwood said that she had been pulled from reporting on the case twice, each time without warning, or explanation.

Agness Underwood never denied being friends with Cohen, and she admitted that he was often a news source; in fact, Cohen had obtained the Lana Turner-Johnny Stompanato letters for Agness Underwood after Turner's daughter, Cheryl, had been indicted for the stabbing death of Stompanato on April 4,1958.

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

Agness Underwood's funeral was held at St James Episcopal Church in downtown Los Angeles on July 7,1984.

Agness Underwood cultivated the day's best sources, ranging from gangsters and prostitutes to movie stars and government officials.

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

On November 11,1956, Agness Underwood was the subject of an episode of the television program This Is Your Life.

Agness Underwood was the subject of a 2017 film documentary entitled Agness Underwood: First Lady of the Newsroom.

The Agness Underwood Reporting Award is offered by the Department of Journalism at California State University, Northridge.

Agness Underwood's archives are held in Special Collections and Archives at CSUN's University Library.