In the White House attic, as moving time approaches

President Roosevelt sits in the White House attic with a variety of items: ears of corn with the label of “presidential tips to farmers,” a picture of Edward Henry Harriman with “my dear Harriman” crossed out and replaced with “undesirable citizen,” “the big stick,” several books, including “How to choose a successor,” a crib “for larger families,” and a coffin of a “nature faker.” Roosevelt holds a book entitled, “Science of Pseudology.” Caption: Mr. Roosevelt–“I wonder how much of this stuff Bill wants me to leave behind.”

comments and context

Comments and Context

The brilliant but largely forgotten body of cartoons that W. A. Carson drew for the front pages of the Utica Saturday Globe — centered, below the masthead and dateline, always in bright colors — often were accompanied by perfectly superfluous printed explanations. Carson’s work was so direct and documentary that written guides were useless; and the work of the anonymous editor was invariably vapid and redundant.

Perhaps the Globe was inspired by the Hearst papers’ famous full-page editorials, often on the opinion section’s back page. Large, elaborate editorial cartoons, often by Winsor McCay, were accompanied by ponderous sermons by editor Arthur Brisbane. But in the case of the Hearst sections, Brisbane’s writing was independent, or logically mature partners to the cartoons. And frequently, as Brisbane acknowledged, the cartoon inspired the text. On the weekly Utica Globe‘s pages, the long captions were like useless vestigial appendages.

In this cartoon Carson employed more captions than he usually resorted to; and the reason was he used the premise of moving from the White House to review the prominent trappings of President Roosevelt’s tenure, all of them peripheral to legislative and regulatory accomplishments.

The predictable icons are there: the Big Stick; a mummy representing the president’s crusade against writers who invested animal stories with human motivations; a large rocking cradle that was reminiscent of his crusade against “race suicide” and advocacy of large families.

The book entitled “Science of Pseudology” on Roosevelt’s lap is a humorous (or, in the caption, slightly sarcastic) reference to Roosevelt’s penchant for calling people liars when he detected prevarication. In that regard, the portrait with shattered glass encapsulates the president’s falling out with railroad baron Edward Henry Harriman. The onetime supporter of the Republican Party was criticized for business practices by Roosevelt; Harriman claimed that the president hypocritically accepted and then denied campaign contributions from Harriman in 1904; the president produced letters from Harriman demanding favors in return for donations, which Roosevelt refused… and so on until Harriman the putative liar eventually was termed by the president an “undesirable citizen.”

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1908-11-14

Creator(s)

Carson, W. A. (William A.), 1862-

Language

English

Period

U.S. President – 2nd Term (March 1905-February 1909)

Page Count

1

Production Method

Printed

Record Type

Image

Resource Type

Cartoon

Rights

These images are presented through a cooperative effort between the Library of Congress and Dickinson State University. No known restrictions on publication.

Citation