Eagles

President Roosevelt examines three new designs for coins: “The Great American Stork Design,” “The Great American Hen Design,” and “The Great American Eagle Design.” Caption: President Roosevelt has ordered some new and more suitable designs for the twenty dollar gold pieces.

comments and context

Comments and Context

President Roosevelt took a great interest in the design of American currency and, especially, coinage. It was one of his extracurricular campaigns for which he was noted, like Simplified Spelling and discouraging authors of anthropomorphic animal tales. He desired that a great country like the United States have great artistic legacies, from statues to coins, as did the great empires of world history.

A stork holds a card with President Roosevelt’s face on it and a message that reads, “Sincere regards, T. Roosevelt.” The stork shows it to an eagle as they both stand right in front of the White House.

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1905-03-19

President Roosevelt points to a stork that holds a basket with three infants. An eagle stands to the side and says, “I’m a dead one.”

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1905-03-16

John D. Rockefeller, dressed up as Uncle Sam, admires himself in a mirror. Uncle Sam is sitting on the left in his underclothes with an eagle perched next to him. A much larger eagle labeled “Aldrich” is perched on a large “Oil” can to the right of Rockefeller.

comments and context

Comments and Context

Good cartoons, serving contemporary readers as they addressed current issues, or readers of future generations seeking to understand the past, usually require few captions. Captions are not necessarily crutches, but occasionally a pictorial presentation can stand on its own. This Frank A. Nankivell cartoon is in that category: Iconic.

Photograph of two young golden eagles in a nest with animal bones nearby in Theodore Roosevelt National Park.

Collection

Theodore Roosevelt National Park

Creation Date

1966-07

Photograph of an eagle’s nest on the side of a cliff along the Wind Canyon Nature Trail in the South Unit of Theodore Roosevelt National Park in the spring of 1963.

Collection

Theodore Roosevelt National Park

Creation Date

1963

A bald eagle, bruised and battered, stands on a pile of spent fireworks, following the celebration of the Fourth of July.

comments and context

Comments and Context

Modern readers might be tempted to see incipient regrets over an Independence Day celebration by the iconic American symbol. But the wan smile reflects the dangers of handling fireworks (perennial warning cartoons that were ubiquitous in magazines of the day), and not a criticism by cartoonist Keppler of the new American Century in any way.

An eagle stands on the “U.S.A.” portion of a globe with its wings extending from “Porto Rico” and “Panama” on the right to the “Philippines” on the left. Caption: “Gee, but this is an awful stretch!”

comments and context

Comments and Context

Cartoonist Joseph Keppler Junior and his magazine tempered their previous week’s Fourth of July fireworks-popping celebration with this graphic representation of the American eagle’s new role in the world. Puck was soundly jingoistic before and during the Spanish-American War; during the foundations of imperial policymaking; and in support of the acquisition of the Canal Zone in Panama.

Independence Day fireworks spell out the word “Freedom” above an eagle forming the great seal of the United States hovering over a bird nest with four chicks labeled “Philippines, Cuba, Hawaii, [and] Porto Rico.”

Collection

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs

Creation Date

1901-07-03

President Roosevelt thanks Judge Pritchard for the eagle, a “great wilderness bird.”

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1905-01-05

President Roosevelt thanks Edgar Buck for his gift of an eagle.

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1904-05-28

A postcard showing the flags of the United States and Australia crossed above an eagle with outstretched wings holding a banner in its beak with the text “E Pluribus Unum.” Above the flags is the text “Independent Order of Odd Fellows.” Next to each flag is the address of the respective country’s head office of the organization.

Comments and Context

In Charles C. Myers’s own words, “This is a souvenir card issued by the Odd Fellows Lodge at Melbourne Australia and distributed among the Odd Fellows of the American Fleet.

I presume many of you are of a wrong impression as to what Australia realy [sic] is. I used to think that Australia was some little Island away off in some corner of the ocean and did not amount to much and when I visited that country I was muchly surprised to find that it was a country nearly as large as the U. S. and equally as well improved and modern in every way and that the cities of Sydney and Melbourne, each a city of half a million inhabitants, are cities of every advantage and as modern as any of the cities of the United States. Australia is one of the chief agricultural countries of the whole world and much of the country is still open for settlement and cultivation. Australia is a place where most all of the people are English and very few of other nationalities are found there.”

Portraits of William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt with an eagle and two United States flags.

Collection

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs

Creation Date

1900

William M. Steward, on the left, and William McKinley, on the right, have a strangle-hold on a bald eagle that has a stars and stripes shield on its breast. They are plucking its feathers and stuffing them into large bags labeled “Silver Grab Bag” and “Tariff Grab Bag.”

Collection

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs

Creation Date

1893-08-23

Cuban General Máximo Gómez sits on a horse, listening to an eagle perched on the U.S. Capitol building singing “the song of freedom.”

Collection

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs

Creation Date

1898-05-11

Uncle Sam and a Chinese man are connected by a large firecracker. Caption: Sam and John, “the Siamese twins” of the Fourth of July.

Collection

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs

Creation Date

1913-07-02

Letter size envelope with a round portrait of Colonel Roosevelt in blue ink surrounded by a ring of white stars on a red background. Above the portrait is an eagle with an American flag in its talons. A lasso reaches from the portrait to a charging bison in the lower right corner.

Collection

Theodore Roosevelt Inaugural National Historic Site

Creation Date

1898

Handwritten draft of chapter four of The Wilderness Hunter. The chapter was published as chapters four and five.

Collection

Harvard College Library

Creation Date

1893

John Burroughs enjoyed Ted Roosevelt’s visit and was impressed with his proficiency at climbing trees. He wishes Roosevelt would come back during eagle season.

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1900-05-25