PM (newspaper)

PM (newspaper)
Name	PM
Caption	Front page of PM, June 15, 1940
Type	Daily newspaper
Format	Broadsheet
Founded	1940
Ceased publication	1948
Founder	Ralph Ingersoll
Political	Independent liberal anti-fascist
Headquarters	New York City
Language	English

PM (newspaper) was a New York City daily newspaper published from 1940 to 1948 known for its distinctive editorial independence and its refusal to accept advertising revenue. It combined reportage, commentary, photography, and comics in a populist, socially conscious style and engaged with contemporary debates about fascism, labor, civil rights, and World War II. PM attracted a cadre of prominent journalists, cartoonists, photographers, and intellectuals and left a contested legacy in journalism, media studies, and archival research.

History

PM was founded in 1940 by journalist and executive Ralph Ingersoll, emerging in the context of the late interwar period and the early years of World War II as a response to concerns about isolationism and the influence of corporate media. Its formation intersected with figures associated with The New Republic, Time (magazine), and the milieu of New York publishing including Condé Nast veterans and staff from The New Yorker and The New York Times. Early editorial planning invoked debates from the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War and the diplomatic crises at Munich Conference and the Axis powers ascendancy. PM’s advertising-free model drew comparisons with earlier ventures such as The Liberator (magazine) and innovations in alternative press funding seen in the history of The Nation and The New Leader.

The newspaper launched amid the 1940 presidential contest involving Franklin D. Roosevelt and Wendell Willkie and covered events such as the Battle of Britain, the Tripartite Pact, and the shifting alliances that culminated in the Attack on Pearl Harbor. During the wartime years, PM navigated the constraints of wartime reporting shaped by institutions like the Office of War Information and policies arising from the Selective Training and Service Act of 1940. Postwar adjustments followed the end of World War II and the onset of tensions later named the Cold War.

Editorial Leadership and Contributors

Ralph Ingersoll served as founder and chief executive, while editorial direction involved figures connected to Ernest Hemingway’s contemporaries, staff recruited from Harper's Magazine, and writers who had written for The New Yorker and Esquire. Regular contributors and columnists included journalists with ties to Edward R. Murrow’s circle at CBS News, critics influenced by Dwight Macdonald, and commentators who had worked at The Atlantic Monthly. Photographers and photojournalists associated with PM had links to the photo workshops of Alfred Stieglitz and networks that included Margaret Bourke-White, Dorothea Lange, and contemporaries from Life (magazine). Cartoonists and illustrators who contributed bore cultural connections to Walt Disney studios alumni and to satirists associated with MAD Magazine precursors.

The masthead over time contained editors from backgrounds in labor reporting connected to unions such as AFL and CIO, critics with ties to Variety (magazine), and cultural writers who had contributed to The New Republic and Partisan Review. Freelance contributors included emigré intellectuals from Vienna and Berlin and American writers who had worked with Vogue (magazine) and Saturday Evening Post.

Content and Political Stance

PM’s pages featured investigative journalism, foreign correspondence, labor coverage, arts criticism, and social commentary. Its editorial line was explicitly anti-fascist and leaned toward democratic liberalism, responding to the policies of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s administration while criticizing isolationists such as Charles Lindbergh and the America First Committee. The paper supported wartime mobilization efforts but maintained a watchdog posture toward agencies like the War Production Board and the Office of Price Administration. It championed civil rights causes that intersected with activism around NAACP campaigns, and its coverage often highlighted labor struggles connected to the Congress of Industrial Organizations.

Cultural pages reviewed theater in the tradition of Broadway criticism, discussed films tied to Warner Bros. and MGM, and ran comics and satire that resonated with readers of The New Yorker and early readers of Life (magazine). PM’s photography department emphasized documentary aesthetics related to the Farm Security Administration photographers and photo-essays reminiscent of projects by Walker Evans.

Distribution, Circulation, and Demise

PM was distributed in the New York metropolitan area via newsstands and street vendors, competing with established dailies such as The New York Times, New York Post, and Daily News (New York) for readership. Its advertising-free model required substantial capital from investors including financiers and patrons linked to publishing houses and philanthropic networks tied to families such as the Rockefeller family and banking interests with connections to J.P. Morgan associates. Circulation peaked in the early 1940s but fiscal pressures, rising newsprint costs regulated under wartime rationing policies, and postwar shifts in advertising and radio/television competition contributed to financial losses.

By the late 1940s, PM faced creditor demands and labor disputes reminiscent of broader press industry conflicts during the period of Taft–Hartley Act enactment and anti-communist tensions such as hearings by the House Un-American Activities Committee. These pressures, combined with changing media consumption patterns tied to the rise of television broadcasting networks like NBC and CBS, led to PM ceasing publication in 1948.

Reception and Influence

Contemporaneous reviews ranged from praise in outlets like The Nation and commentary from critics associated with Partisan Review to criticism from conservative papers and columnists allied with William F. Buckley Jr. later movements. PM influenced subsequent alternative press ventures and magazine experiments, informing editorial experiments in publications such as Ramparts (magazine), New York Review of Books, and the later underground newspapers of the 1960s connected to Ramparts contributors and to activists in Students for a Democratic Society. Its photographic and design innovations resonated with editors at Life (magazine) and influenced visual journalism practices adopted by Time (magazine) and magazine studios linked to Condé Nast.

Scholars in media history and journalism studies have debated PM’s stance during the early Cold War, comparing it to contemporaneous publications like The New Leader and assessing its circulation among intellectual circles that included contributors to Commentary (magazine) and to the editorial networks of The New Republic.

Archival Access and Legacy

Archival holdings of PM are maintained in research libraries and special collections with connections to institutions such as Columbia University, New York Public Library, and university archives linked to Princeton University and Harvard University. Microfilm and digitized runs appear alongside related collections of photographers and journalists whose papers are housed at repositories including the Library of Congress and the archives of The New School. Film and oral histories referencing PM can be found in audiovisual collections associated with Museum of Modern Art programs and documentary projects curated by institutions like the Smithsonian Institution.

PM’s legacy persists in journalism curricula at schools such as Columbia Journalism School and in studies of press independence, documentary photojournalism, and mid-20th-century American intellectual networks, informing scholarship across disciplines that examine the interplay among media, politics, and culture.

Category:Newspapers published in New York City