The following essay discusses Oveta Hobby and her husband, Will.

The twentieth-century version of Texas publisher-politico was pioneered by William Pettus "Will" Hobby, governor of Texas from 1917 to 1921 and president of the Houston Post from 1932 to 1955, and his second wife, Oveta Culp Hobby, secretary of the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare from 1953 to 1955 and editor or top executive of the Post since 1955. They were each born into families rich in public-service heritage, and each came early to journalism and politics.

Will's journalism involvement began in 1894 at age sixteen in the circulation department of the Post; at age nineteen Oveta also started work there. Politics was a game Will was content to observe from the sidelines as editor and publisher of the Beaumont Enterprise (Texas) from 1907 to 1914, when he agreed to file as a candidate for the Democratic nomination for lieutenant governor. "I can't tie a...