Ex-CIA analyst is now a beer historian

WASHINGTON - She started her career in the shadows working for the CIA, but a historian at a prestigious Washington museum has been thrust into the limelight after the US media dubbed her job researching beer the "coolest in the world."

Theresa McCulla, 34, emerged from anonymity in January to be hired by the National Museum of American History as its brewing historian.

As a woman catapulted into an ultra-masculine, multibillion-dollar industry, McCulla has had to work hard to prove her credibility.