Marquis Childs

Marquis William Childs (March 17, 1903 – June 30, 1990) was a 20th-century American journalist, syndicated columnist, and author.

Childs was born on March 17, 1903, in Clinton, Iowa.

He graduated from Lyons High School in Clinton in 1918, and received a B.A. in 1923 and Litt.D. in 1966 from the University of Wisconsin–Madison.

After working for United Press in several Midwestern cities (including Chicago) since 1923, he attended the University of Iowa and completed his M.A. in 1925.

In 1925, Childs rejoined United Press and then in 1926 joined the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, where he would remain off and on until 1944, mostly serving as a feature writer for its American Mercury magazine section.

In 1932 Childs wrote an article for Harper's (published in the November issue) that was not so warmly received in his hometown.

"River Town," a collection of thinly disguised tales of prominent Clinton citizens, was thought by natives to be at best in poor taste, and at worst, outrageous, although it was read by many with glee.

In 1933 Childs visited Europe, returning to the United States in June 1934 as a member of the Washington staff of the Post-Dispatch.

A pamphlet and two books developed from this experience: Sweden: Where Capitalism is Controlled (1934), Sweden: the Middle Way (1936), and This is Democracy; Collective Bargaining in Scandinavia (1938).

With Sweden: the Middle Way, Childs first came to literary prominence.

Critics agreed that it showed "striking observation, faithful reporting, and vigorous journalism of a high order"; President Roosevelt was inspired to send a special commission abroad to study European cooperative systems.

He traveled 15,000 miles with President Franklin D. Roosevelt during the 1936 re-election campaign, and briefly with candidates Alfred M. Landon and Norman Thomas.

A Harper's article entitled "They Hate Roosevelt!"

was expanded into a campaign pamphlet and given wide circulation throughout the United States.

Childs took a leave of absence from the Post-Dispatch to attend a housing exposition in Sweden; he remained there to write a series for the newspaper on Sweden's social and economic advances.

Childs's first novel, Washington Calling! (1937), was called "unquestionably the most intelligent novel of Washington since Harvey Ferguson's Capitol Hill."

That same year Childs traveled to Spain and wrote a series of articles on the Spanish Civil War for the Post-Dispatch.

He expressed anti-Franco and pro-Loyalist sentiments.

The next country subjected to Childs's appraisal was Mexico.

His series on oil expropriation was so controversial that a United States Senate investigation followed.

He was chastised on and off the Senate floor by oilman and Senator Joseph F. Guffey of Pennsylvania.

Childs sued Guffey for slander, won a full apology on the floor of the Senate, then withdrew the suit.

In the early 1940s, Childs published several books that won renewed critical acclaim: Toward a Dynamic America with William T. Stone; This Is Your War ("succinct and stimulating," said The New York Times); and I Write from Washington.

During the spring of 1943, as guest of the Swedish Foreign Office, Childs again visited Sweden and became interested in the role of neutrals in World War II; this led him to investigate conditions in Switzerland, upon which he reported in a Saturday Evening Post article.

Relaxation for Childs during the war years came with horseback riding and figure skating—"When you're trying to keep your balance on a backward eight, you can't think about either your own or the world's troubles."

He began writing his column Washington Calling in February 1944 and published The Cabin (an autobiographical novel) that year:

"' 'Some day,' he said, 'I'll ride on trains whenever I want to ... I'll be important and at small towns people will look in at the window. They'll say, 'I've seen his picture in the newspapers.' Why he should have this fame was never clear in the fantasies he created within the still, closed pool of his mind.'"

In 1944, Childs rejoined his old news agency, the United Press.

On November 21, 1947, Childs wrote an essay that exposed the Justice Department's grand jury investigations into Soviet espionage and all but named Elizabeth Bentley as a witness.

The grand jury investigations led to congressional testimony before the House Un-American Activities Committee by not only Bentley but also Whittaker Chambers during the summer of 1948 (during the presidential campaign season).

Childs was a friend of Laurence Duggan, a Soviet spy or Communist fellow traveler as alleged by both Bentley and Chambers; Childs contributed to a private book memorializing Duggan.

(In 1951 Childs partially redeemed himself in the eyes of the offended with an article, "The Town I Like—Clinton, Iowa," which appeared in the May–June issue of the Lincoln-Mercury Times).

During another stint with the Post-Dispatch (1954–1962), Childs wrote essays for American Heritage and Holiday and published: Ethics in a Business Society, which was translated into Japanese and Portuguese; The Peacemakers, which appeared in foreign language editions in Denmark, Sweden, The Netherlands, and France; The Ragged Edge: The Erosion of Individual Liberties; and best-sellers Eisenhower: Captive Hero and Walter Lippmann and His Times, co-edited with James Reston.

Surprisingly, there are two three-act plays, Maud and Madame Minister, among the Childs materials collected by the University of Iowa.

While at the United Press, the Post-Dispatch continued to carry his United Press work until he returned to the paper full-time in 1954.

The years 1954–1962 were spent as chief correspondent for the Post-Dispatch.

In 1969, he obtained a second Litt.D. from the University of Iowa.

Following his college graduation, Childs worked briefly for United Press.

He then returned to the University of Iowa to teach English composition before rejoining United Press, this time in New York.

"My father," wrote Childs, "was a lawyer and his father was a farmer, as his forebears apparently had been since the time of Adam. Why I wanted, from the age of thirteen or fourteen, to be a newspaperman I've never quite understood."