The Press: New Man on the Job

Into the $18,000-a-year job of press secretary for President Truman this week stepped Joseph Hudson Short Jr., 46, Virginia Military Institute graduate, veteran newsman and Baltimore Sun White House correspondent for the last five years. Mississippi-born Joe Short got to know Harry Truman well while covering his vice-presidential campaign of 1944, has been a good friend ever since.

As Short moved in, Stephen T. Early, who had been filling in since the death of Charles G. Ross (TIME, Dec. 18), bowed out with a little quip. Said Early, now a vice president of Pullman, Inc.: “If it was [a job as] a dollar-a-year man, I figure the President owes me about four and six-tenths cents.”