Hard‐Talking Lobbyist

WASHINGTON, March 5 —Mrs. Dita Davis Beard, the purported author of a memorandum linking the. International Telephone and Telegraph Corporation's reported contribution to the 1972 Republican convention with settlement of three antitrust suits against the company, is one of the capital's thousands of lobbyists who work behind the scenes and make every effort to stay out of the public limelight.

Woman In the News

Even today, after her name has been in the headlines for several days few details of her life and activities were available here. However, she has been described by those who know her as a hardtalking, strong‐minded fiercely independent woman.

“She's one of the boys talks like a man in a poker game,” one friend said.

Edward Gerrity, I.T.T. vice president for public relations, said, “She has the vocabulary of a drill instructor in the Marines.”

When Mrs. Beard became ill on a flight to Denver Thursday, she was asked if she wanted a doctor.

“I don't need a damn doctor,” she reportedly told stewardess.

Mrs. Beard was born in Fort, Riley, Kan., in November, 1918. “Her father was at least a colonel,” Mr. Gerrity said. “She has an awful lot of army friends.”

A Good Rifle Shot

Formerly a horse rider, Mrs. Beard is reputed to be a camping and skiing enthusiast and a good rifle shot. However in the last two years she may have curtailed those activities because of her heart ailment.

“She has been complaining of heart trouble for the past two years,” Mr. Gerrity said. “She told me her doctor has said she had emphysema as well. I tried to get her to take a physical with our company doctors, but she adamantly refused. She said Dr. Liszka would take care of her.”

The staff.directors of both the House and Senate Commerce. Committees and of the subcommittees on communications, which deal with legislation affecting I.T.T., have rarely if ever seen Mrs. Beard.

Some Congressional sources and officials in the White House and the communications industry expressed astonishment today that a person about whom so little was known could wield the influence that Mrs. Beard is said to command at the highest levels of Government.

Mrs. Beard completed four years of high school followed by what she described on her I.T.T. biography form as “extensive travel and informal tutoring.” She never went to college.

Mrs. Beard has been married and divorced twice and has five children, some of whom still live at home. But she gets no alimony or child support from either of her former husbands, according to Mr. Gerrity.

Mrs. Beard lives in suburban Arlington, Va. She is tall and has “put on weight in the last few years,” according to Mr. Gerrity.

Makes $40,000 a Year

Mrs. Beard joined I.T.T.'s Washington office in 1961 as secretary to an executive after working for the National Association of Broadcasters. A few years later she was promoted to her present position.

She makes between $40,000 and $45,000 as special assistant to William Merriam, I.T.T. vice president in charge of its Washington office.

Mrs. Beard, who is described as “very direct,” frequents the Capitol Hill Club.

An acquaintance recalled today that once at a Republican dinner meeting there to plan fund‐raising strategy, a party official, disagreeing with a proposal, stood up and used a profanity. Noticing Mrs. Beard, the only woman in the audience, he apologized for his language to “the lady present.”

Mrs. Beard replied, “I don't see any ladies present.”