Early Life and Background
Abbas Masoudi was born in 1915 in Tehran, into a modest family. His early years coincided with the tumultuous final decade of the Qajar dynasty and the rise of Reza Khan, who would soon establish the Pahlavi monarchy in 1925. Iran in the 1910s and 1920s was a country of dramatic transformation—political upheavals, foreign interventions, and the slow emergence of modern state institutions.
Unlike many of his contemporaries who pursued elite educations, Masoudi began working at a very young age. At just thirteen, he entered the world of print by working as a typewriter in a printing house in Tehran. This humble beginning gave him hands-on knowledge of printing techniques, typesetting, and the rhythm of newspaper production. It also exposed him to the networks of Tehran’s intellectuals, journalists, and publishers.
This early exposure was critical. Journalism in Iran was not merely a profession; it was often a form of activism, a platform for debate, and sometimes a battlefield for competing ideologies. Masoudi’s years in the printing house served as both an apprenticeship and a springboard for his later ambitions.
