Did you know that one of the Watergate era's most polarizing figures was a Pine Bluff native?
Meet Martha Elizabeth Beall Mitchell, the wife of John Mitchell, United States attorney general under President Richard Nixon. She became a controversial figure with her outspoken comments about the government at the time of the Watergate scandal.
Martha Beall Mitchell, the daughter of Arie Ferguson and George V. Beall, was born in Pine Bluff on Sept. 2, 1918. She grew up in the city, graduated from Pine Bluff High School and attended Stephens College in Columbia, Mo., and the University of Arkansas. She completed her Bachelor of Arts degree requirements at the University of Miami in Florida.
She first married Clyde Jennings Jr. of Lynchburg, Va., whom she divorced. She then married John Mitchell, who was appointed U.S. attorney general by President Richard Nixon. Martha Beall Mitchell won worldwide recognition by her outspokenness during the Nixon administration.
In fact, she holds the distinction of being the very first Watergate whistleblower. Because she was a woman in a man's world calling attention to political misdeeds, she was written off as crazy, unstable and an alcoholic. Her enemies stopped at nothing to discredit her.
The birthplace and childhood home of Martha Beall Mitchell, now the Martha Beall Mitchell Home and Museum, was added to the National Register of Historic Places in January 1978. On the second anniversary of her death, Martha Mitchell Expressway in Pine...
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