Francis Whiting Halsey

Francis Whiting Halsey (October 15, 1851 – November 24, 1919) was an American journalist, editor and historian, born in Unadilla, New York.

Francis Halsey prepared for college at the Unadilla academy and graduated from Cornell University in 1873, taking one of the prizes for an essay in English literature.

His original works included travel writing (Two Months Abroad, collecting his reportage for the Tribune on the Paris World's Fair (1878)), New York State history (The Old New York Frontier (1901), The Pioneers of Unadilla Village, 1784-1840 (1902), and a number of articles), literary criticism (Our Literary Deluge And Some of Its Deeper Waters (1902)) and family history (extended introduction to Thomas Halsey of Hertfordshire, England and Southampton, Long Island (1895)).

As a compiler and editor, he assembled several enormous collections of, inter alia, famous speeches, prose literary works, travel narratives and writings about American history.

His major achievement was the ten-volume Literary Digest History of the World War, consisting largely of skillfully collated and rewritten newspaper accounts and official documents, enhanced by a plethora of photographs.