Morris was born in
Chicago,
Illinois in 1903 to a
Jewish family, the son of Constance Lily (née Rothschild) and
Ira Nelson Morris. His mother was the daughter of
Victor Henry Rothschild; and his father was the son of
Nelson Morris, the founder of
Morris & Company, one of the three main meat-packing companies in Chicago. He graduated with a B.A. from
Harvard University. As his father was a diplomat who was named the
Minister to
Sweden (1914–1923), the younger Morris was raised abroad. Morris wrote both fiction and non-fiction works which focused on international politics and Americans living abroad. After visiting the countries devastated by
World War II, Morris started writing many articles criticizing the conduct of the war and later, the cold war. His wife wrote
The Flowers of Hiroshima (1959) which exposed the aftereffects of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. They founded the Edita and Ira Morris Hiroshima Foundation for Peace and Culture which assisted victims of the bombings. ==Personal life==