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Anthony Comstock, as a monk, thwarts shameless displays of excessive flesh, whether that of women, horses, or dogs, with a “Jane Doe Warrant.”
Anthony Comstock, father of “Comstockery” — the assertion of Victorian moral values on society — continued his crusades past the Victorian Era, to his death in 1915. The term has survived because some people maintain that his puritanical attitudes have survived to today.
The devil delivers a tiny piece of ice to a bloated businessman labeled “The Ice Man” wearing a fur coat and sitting on a heater in Hell. Caption: Satan — Yep, this is the biggest fifty pounds I can let you have. On account of the mild winter, ice is very scarce here!
Cartoonist L. M. Glackens scored a hat trick with his cover cartoon about ice deliveries in hot summer months. As a purely humorous cartoon, and in the days prior to electric home refrigeration, virtually every reader would appreciate the jab at ice deliveries literally shaving the weight of blocks for home ice boxes.
A beautiful young woman emerges from a church on Easter. A cluster of well-dressed men, all eager for her hand, are waiting. Two of the men turn away a devil figure dressed in red. Caption: Who hath not owned, with rapture smitten frame, / The power of grace.–Campbell.
Once again at Eastertide, Puck turns its attention not to the Passion or Resurrection of Christ but — as most magazines and newspapers did for thematic material between Lent and after Easter — to social freedom before Lent, restrained socializing during Lent and Holy Week, and a return to courtship and the social whirl after Easter. It was the common thematic preoccupations of cartoons, poems, short fiction, and even editorials in the time.
A devil takes the lid off a box labeled “Society” allowing fumes to escape which show the liberation of women, such as being granted divorces, horseback riding, driving automobiles, gambling, and smoking in social situations.
Ehrhart’s Puck cartoon appeared a week before Easter in 1904. While its constituent details seem overtly scolding and of a moralizing nature, this double-page cartoon was really the contemporary cartoonists’ stereotypical theme at every year’s end of the Lenten season. Earthly pleasures and frivolous pastimes, putatively suppressed during Lent, were released after Easter, at least in the minds of editorial cartoonists of the day.
Outside a church, an old woman labeled “Democratic Party” stands between William Jennings Bryan as a friar labeled “16 to 1” and Arthur P. Gorman as the devil. She is smiling as she looks toward the devil. Caption: Mephisto Gorman — You’ve been fasting long enough with dull Friar William. Follow me. I’ll lead you to -.
One of the thematic preoccupations of cartoonists in these years was the end of Lent — signifying (in cartoons, if not in real life) shedding the bonds of holy circumspection. In the interior pages, black-and-white humorous cartoons dealt with society girls and eligible bachelors. Sometimes dealing with temptations. Cartoonist Pughe adds politics and current events to mix in this center-spread cartoon in Puck.
A large red devil turns the crank of a large wheel decorated with scenes of gambling and with male and female figures labeled “Reformers,” “Citizen’s Committee,” “Women’s League,” and “Salvation,” as well as police officers hanging onto the wheel as it spins.
Published just after Easter, this Puck cartoon visited a frequent theme of cartoonists, as well as clergy and reformers, especially during the Lenten season, about sinful habits, and how society could ameliorate the unfortunate results of wanton behavior. Easter sermons predictably made headlines in these times.
Frances A. Meyer seeks to “impart some of the Revelation God, my Father, made to me…and which He commissioned me especial to make known to men.”
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1911-04-20
Newspaper clipping of cartoon showing a man labeled “Railroad Magnate”, possibly J.P. Morgan, dressed as a monk, knocking on the door of “Doctor Roosevelt” at the White House. Cartoon refers to Roosevelt’s efforts to regulate railroads.
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1903
A devil wearing a business suit holds a fire brand labeled “Arson” in one hand and a large knife labeled “Murder” in the other. He is accepting a payment for $10,000 from a hand labeled “Vast Sums on Uninvestigated Risks.” The hand extends from a “Fire Insurance” company with a motto that states, “We Insure Everything and Anybody” on the corner of the building. Caption: The big insurance companies, by carelessness in their selection of agents, adjusters and risks, place a premium on crime.
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1895-11-20
Illinois governor John R. Tanner appears as a devilish executioner holding a gallows, with noose, labeled “For Capitalists.” The “Illinois” capitol building is in the background.
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1898-11-09
A member of the clergy, a strict “Sabbatarian,” observes and deplores people engaging in various Sunday activities, including boating and bicycling. In the center vignette, Satan objects to the Sunday outings, too, because they seem “to make people better, instead of worse.”
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1897-05-26
A woman, standing in front of a mirror, wears a tight dress designed by the Devil, who crouches behind the mirror. Other women, wearing revealing costumes from different eras, stand on the left. Caption: His Majesty the Designer — This modern costume is the best asset my business ever had!
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1910-11-30
Theodore Roosevelt appears as a two-faced Janus chess game piece. On the left is an angelic “Roosevelt The National Savior” and on the right a devilish “Roosevelt the National Menace.” Caption: It all depends on the way you look at him.
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1910-11-09
A bright red devil hides in a garden of white Easter lilies.
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1910-03-23
Illustration showing Jay Gould as the Devil holding a paper labeled “Majority of Stock”, standing outside an office labeled “Successor to Satan”; he is presiding over the “Hades & World Lightning Transportation Line” which is a railroad train headed for a station labeled “Terminus – President Jay Gould.” The locomotive is labeled “Crasher” and uses “Brimstone” for fuel, a passenger car is labeled “Only Anti-Monopolists Carried,” also the “Sulphuric Telegraph Co. – Gould Pres.” which has many devil-like demons stringing wire cables on telegraph poles and an office where telegraph operators work at desks beneath a sign that states “Any Imp who attempts to strike will be transferred to the Western Union Company”, as well as “The Bottomless Pit Roasting Co. – Jay Gould, Pres.” where an “Anti-Monopolist editor”, “Puck”, and “Thurber” are roasted “in effigy.” At bottom, a man labeled “Satan Janitor”, with bandages, carries a scuttle filled with brimstone, a watering-can labeled “Kerosene”, a broom, and a key ring, skulks down the steps from Gould’s office. Caption: How the place will be run, two years after Jay Gould’s arrival.
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1883-09-19
A number of historical figures enjoy the pleasant atmosphere of “Sheol” after suffering the flames of Hell. At left is a dejected Devil sitting beneath a sign that states, “This Business is Removed to Sheol, Opposite.” Among those ferried across the river by “Charon” are “Hypatia, Fanny Elssler, Voltaire, Frederick [the] Great, Socrates, J. Offenbach, Darwin, J. S. Mill, Rousseau, George Sand, Galileo, Jefferson, Th. Paine, Goethe, [and] H. Heine.” Caption: According to the new version of the Old Testament, many respectable people who have been writhing in the old fashioned Hell will have to be transferred to the pleasant watering-place known as “Sheol.” This is Puck’s notion of the evolution of Hell to Sheol.
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1885-05-27
A well dressed man holding a “Hymn” book stands between two young women dressed as devils.
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1913-03-12
A well-dressed man carries his wife’s Easter bonnet beneath an umbrella, so that in her absence, due to an illness, at least her bonnet will be seen in public. Caption: His wife was ill.
Cartoonist L. M. Glackens had the assignment to draw the cover for Puck‘s holiday issue (special numbers usually were arranged for Easter, Mid-Summer, Thanksgiving, and Christmas) in 1908. As he matured as an artist, his handsome work was ever more evident in Puck; and the young Welshman J. S. Pughe was ill throughout the year, reducing his own workload.
Theodore Roosevelt as Martin Luther drafts his “Message to Congress Series H No. 4723.” He is standing at a desk and is about to throw an ink pot at the devil who is hovering to the right, holding up a crown labeled “3rd Term” while shying away from possible injury.
“Martin Luther Roosevelt” is one of Udo J. Keppler’s most famous cartoons. Starkly simple yet powerful in presentation, it requires modern readers to know something of Theodore Roosevelt’s position on another presidential race, in 1908; and of a momentous event in the life of Protestant reformer Martin Luther.
A city sidewalk is crowded with women who are denied entry to upscale shops. An old woman labeled “Necessity” creates a maelstrom that drives many of the women to seek shelter where they can, which happens to be a brightly illuminated building topped with a “$” where the Devil is sitting, waiting for them. Caption: It is not inclination, but necessity, that drives the underpaid shop-girl to the Devil.
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1912-12-11