Women’s History Month: Beverley Morales
Day 29 of Women’s History month features Beverley Brink Morales She grew up on a Montana ranch where she punched cattle, dehorned calves, and herded sheep. She graduated from Montana State University and was hired by a newspaper to cover snow ski competitions and prizefights.
After some public relations positions, she was hired as a society reporter at the Mexico News in Mexico City. She married the newspaper’s sports editor, Hector Morales. The couple came to the U.S. in 1956 and ran a newspaper in North Dakota.
In 1959, she became an assistant editor in the Miami Herald’s women’s section – the top women’s section in the country. Unlike many women’s page journalists she was a mother – she had three children.
When the Pompano Beach Sun-Sentinel was started in April 1960, she was heading up the women’s section. In September 1960, she won three Florida Women’s Press Association awards. After an argument with her editor, brought on by her Penney-Missouri award-winning ways, she was fired in 1961. She worked on several projects, before the Sun-Sentinel rehired her in 1966. Sadly, her youngest child died in the family pool in 1967. She divorced Hector and became a women’s page editor in Ohio for a few years.
In the 1970s, she moved back to Montana and became a grant writer, while continuing to be a freelance journalist. She helped Native Americans gain millions of dollars in grants. While there, she married and became Beverley Badhorse. She eventually moved to Alaska and continued to help Native Americans with grants.
