Carl Crow (1884–1945) was a Highland, Missouri-born newspaperman, businessman, and author who managed several newspapers and then opened the first Western advertising agency in Shanghai, China. He ran the agency for 19 years, creating calendar advertisements and the so-called sexy China Girl poster. He was also the founding editor of the Shanghai Evening Post and Mercury. He was very anti-Japanese, and fearing retribution he left Shanghai for good in 1937, just days after the Japanese attacked as part of the Second Sino-Japanese War's Battle of Shanghai. He died in Manhattan in 1945.