PM was a liberal-leaning daily newspaper published in New York City by Ralph Ingersoll from June 1940 to June 1948 and financed by Chicago millionaire Marshall Field III.

The paper borrowed many elements from weekly news magazines, such as many large photos and at first was bound with staples. In an attempt to be free of pressure from business interests, it did not accept advertising. These departures from the norms of newspaper publishing created excitement in the industry. Some 11,000 people applied for the 150 jobs available when the publication first hired staff.

Publication history

[[File:HankbyWaugh.jpg|right|350px|thumb|In 1945, Coulton Waugh employed a novel art approach on his PM strip Hank. According to Waugh, Hank was "a deliberate attempt to work in the field of social usefulness." (There is no historical evidence for the suggestion that the name was an abbreviation of Picture Magazine.)

The first year of the paper was a general success, though it was already in some financial trouble: its circulation of 100,000–200,000 was insufficient. Circulation averaged 165,000, but the paper never managed to sell the 225,000 copies a day it needed to break even. Marshall Field III had become the paper's funder; quite unusually, he was a "silent partner" in this continually money-losing undertaking. but Anya Schiffrin has said that the paper frequently opposed the policies of the Communist Party (CP) and engaged in editorial battles with the CP's paper, the Daily Worker.

Staff

Editors

Leo Huberman was labor editor.

Writers

I. F. Stone was the paper's Washington correspondent. He published an award-winning series on European Jewish refugees attempting to run the British blockade to reach Palestine (later collected and published as Underground to Palestine). Staffers included theater critic Louis Kronenberger and film critic Cecelia Ager. Kenneth G. Crawford wrote for PM from 1939 to 1942.

The sports writers were Tom Meany, Tom O’Reilly and George F. T. Ryall, who covered horse racing. Sophie Smoliar was the New York City reporter working frequently with photographer Arthur Felig ("Weegee") (submitted by her son and a collection of her original articles). Elizabeth Hawes wrote about fashion, and her sister Charlotte Adams covered food.

General and cited references

  • Jason E. Hill (2018). Artist as Reporter: Weegee, Ad Reinhardt, and the PM News Picture. Oakland, Calif.: University of California Press. .
  • Paul Milkman (1997). PM: A New Deal in Journalism 1940–1948. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press. .
  • Fulton History newspaper archive for PM
  • Morris Engel Archive
  • Old Magazine Articles
  • Kansas State University
  • Dr. Seuss Went to War