Thomas Prentice Kettell (born 1811,[1] died October 22, 1878[2]) was a 19th-century American political economist, magazine editor, and author.
Kettell wrote for the New York Herald starting in 1835 as a financial columnist.
The magazine later expanded its title to United States Economist, Dry Good Reporter, and Bank, Railroad and Commercial Chronicle.
He had some success in styling his magazines as American competitors to the British publication The Economist.
The book received wide acclaim among secessionists in the South and much derision from anti-slavery politicians in the North, even though Kettell intended it as an argument that the two regions were economically dependent upon each other.