Heat

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!

comments and context

Comments and Context

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.

At center a group of six men, including John D. Rockefeller and E. B. Thomas, warm themselves by a stove labeled “Standard Oil.” At bottom left Andrew Carnegie burns “U.S. Steel Bonds” and Charles Schwab attempts to burn “Steel Common” stocks. On the right Chauncey Depew burns speeches. On the middle left a tramp rests against a haystack in the warm sun. On the right William Jennings Bryan generates hot air while speaking to a group of farmers. On the top left a family burns the furniture in a fireplace. On the right E. B. Thomas sits in front of a fireplace where a lump of “Radium” is warming the room.

comments and context

Comments and Context

Eben B. Thomas had risen from telegraph operator to the presidency of the Erie Railroad (and eventually the Lehigh Valley Railroad). He was very successful at consolidating rail lines and their efficiency, and maintaining labor harmony in an era of conflict. In his position he became a useful ally of J. P. Morgan, John D. Rockefeller, and Andrew Carnegie, especially in his geographic “domain” of central Pennsylvania, land of oil, coal, and steel mills.

Startled French soldiers in rice paddies confront an angry blazing sun rimmed with cannon barrels and bayonets, and stating “Population 500,000,000.” Signs labeled “Malaria, Disease, [and] Fever,” as well as Chinese soldiers also face them. Caption: China – “I will make it HOT for you!”

Collection

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs

Creation Date

1883-09-12

On an extremely hot day in New York City, a man decides to go to Coney Island to cool off. Vignettes show that first, he has to ride on a stuffy streetcar through Brooklyn, then he stands in a long line for the bathhouse, next there is a thunderstorm, after that is a sweltering ride on the subway, and finally he arrives at the comfortable confines of home. Caption: The combination of a hot day, a sizzling mortal and the Isle of Coney.

comments and context

Comments and Context

This center-spread cartoon is a typical Puck midsummer topic — and a respite from the incessant political news of candidates’ machinations and the two nominating conventions in 1908 — by the typically clever L. M. Glackens, who was assuming an increasing workload in the weekly.