Henry George Seldes[1] (/ˈsɛldəs/ SEL-dəs;[aa][citation needed] November 16, 1890 – July 2, 1995) was an American investigative journalist, foreign correspondent, editor, author, and media critic best known for the publication of the newsletter In Fact from 1940 to 1950.

Influenced by Lincoln Steffens and Walter Lippmann,[2][3] Seldes's career began when he was hired at the Pittsburgh Leader at the age of 19.

In 1917, during World War I, he moved to France to work at the Marshall Syndicate, where he was a member of the press corps of the American Expeditionary Force.

[7] He would leave the Tribune when he battled with its owner and publisher, Robert R. McCormick, over the paper altering his 1927 articles on Mexico criticizing the use of their mineral rights by American companies, which he considered to be censorship.

In 1929, Seldes became a freelance reporter and author, subsequently writing a series of books and criticism about his years as a foreign correspondent, and the issues of censorship, suppression and distortion in the press.

He cited J. Edgar Hoover and the FBI for anti-union campaigns, and brought attention to the National Association of Manufacturers' use of advertising dollars to produce news stories favorable to its members and suppress unfavorable ones.

He became a member of the press corps of the American Expeditionary Forces in France, section G-2D, and as such was commissioned as an officer, as were all journalists in that group.

"If the Hindenburg interview had been passed by Pershing's censors at the time, it would have been headlined in every country civilized enough to have newspapers and undoubtedly would have made an impression on millions of people and became an important page in history," wrote Seldes.

In his account, General Pershing planned to capture the city, but on September 1 the Germans decided to remove their forces from Saint-Mihiel to reinforce other positions.

Seldes claimed no shots were fired as the first Americans, he among them, entered the city on September 13 to be greeted as liberators before General Pershing, Pétain, and other high-ranking officers arrived.

At the instigation of war correspondent Floyd Gibbons, he dropped the name "Henry", and started covering international affairs, despite originally being relunctant to do so.

The expulsion was facilitated, according to Seldes, after his publisher and owner, "Colonel" Robert R. McCormick, failed to show sufficient respect when writing to the Soviets to protest censorship.

[22][23] In 1927, the Chicago Tribune sent Seldes to Mexico, but his articles criticizing American corporations for their use of that country's mineral rights were not well received.

Seldes returned to Europe, but found that his work increasingly censored to fit the political views of the newspaper's owner, McCormick.

This was followed by an exposé of the global arms industry, Iron, Blood and Profits (1934) and an account of Benito Mussolini, Sawdust Caesar (1935).

[4] He took the title of the latter from a speech by Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes: "Our ancestors did not fight for the right of a few Lords of the Press to have almost exclusive control of and censorship over the dissemination of news and ideas.

"[24] Time was initially positive in its response: "A rambling but effective attack on U. S. newspapers, charging coloring, distortion or suppression of vital news, containing some enlightening instances of journalistic malpractices as George Seldes encountered them during his career as correspondent.

[29] On August 4, 1939, Seldes, along with 400 other writers and intellectuals, signed a letter condemning anti-Soviet attitudes in the United States, called for better relations between the two countries, described the Soviet Union as a supporter of world peace, and said, "The Soviet Union considers political dictatorship a transitional form and has shown a steadily expanding democracy".

When Time reviewed the latter, it noted several of Seldes' works and said he "stuck out his tongue at Benito Mussolini ... thumbed his nose at U. S. journalism ... and uttered some hoarse Bronx cheers at the Roman Catholic Church."

[8] Throughout the 10-year run of In Fact, Seldes published more than 50 stories on the health effects of tobacco and the cigarette industry's attempts at suppressing such news.

"[36] In Fact also attacked Charles Lindbergh for his Nazi sympathies, the American Legion for helping to break strikes,[8] and labeled many captains of industry as "native fascists."

"[40] One Thousand Americans introduced a wide audience to the Business Plot, a supposed plan of America's corporate elite to overthrow the U.S. government in the early 1930s.

According to KGB documents, Seldes was a longtime secret member of the U.S. Communist Party since well before 1940 who was valued for his "major connections" in Washington.

As the Cold War took shape at the end of the decade, Seldes lost readership from both the Communists and the anti-liberal-left sentiment that was sweeping the country, including a trade union movement that had contained some of his largest audience.

[45] The nationwide atmosphere of McCarthyism and red-baiting further diminished his subscribers' numbers, and he was financially forced to close In Fact, which never accepted advertising, in October 1950.

The 1972 Watergate disclosures, it is true, were made by only a score of the members of the mass media, but I remember Teapot Dome when only one of our 1,750 dailies (the Albuquerque Morning Journal) dared to tell the truth about White House corruption.

"[10][50] According to journalist Randolph T. Holhut, when he met Seldes in 1992, the latter had suffered a stroke "a couple of years earlier", which had "slowed him somewhat", had good memory of the past but not the present, required round-the-clock care and was unable to walk alone, "tired easily and [...] spent much of each day sleeping", and still could see but not hear.

A delegation of journalists attended the memorial service at his home in Hartland Four Corners, Vermont, read from his books and watched an excerpt from Tell the Truth and Run: George Seldes and the American Press, a documentary in progress.

[4] He was married to Helen Larkin Seldes, née Wiesman, from 1932 to her death in 1979,[4][8] at the age of 74, in Spain, while they were tourists there, of a rare blood condition.

[72] They met a second time at another party, where she told him that his and other accounts dissuaded her from moving to Moscow; he invited her to dinner at a restaurant, then took her to his home, and from then they started living together, marrying after a while.