Creel, George

Creel, George (1876–1953) journalist, government official; born in Lafayette County, Mo. A self-educated muckraking journalist who founded the Kansas City Independent (1898–1909), he wrote exposés for Cosmopolitan and attacked child labor in The Children of Bondage (1914). During World War I, President Wilson named him head of the Committee on Public Information (1917–20), responsible for both propaganda at home in support of the war, and information abroad about America. In later years he turned to writing popular history and columns for Collier's.