American journalist, coeditor and publisher—with his cousin Robert Rutherford McCormick (McCormick, Robert R)—of the Chicago Tribune from 1914 to 1925; he subsequently became better known as editor and publisher of the New York Daily News, the first successful tabloid newspaper in the United States.

Patterson was a Tribune staff member from 1901, an Illinois state legislator (1903–04), and Chicago commissioner of public works (1905–06). He served as a war correspondent in 1914–15 and, after the United States entered World War I in 1917, as a combat officer. With McCormick he founded the New York Daily News (first published June 26, 1919), which, because of its sensationalism, soon attained a circulation of nearly one million, the largest among American tabloids. Relinquishing to McCormick his authority over the Tribune, Patterson became sole editor and publisher of the Daily News in 1925. A mild socialist as a young man, he later became more conservative, as did the Daily News. His sister, Eleanor Medill Patterson (Patterson, Eleanor Medill), was yet another grandchild of Joseph Medill (Medill, Joseph) who influenced American journalism: she was owner and editor in chief of the Washington Times-Herald.