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President Roosevelt tells Charles Emory Smith that he was told Judge Hosea Townsend has certain physical and mental “peculiarities” due to his age that cause others to view him as “obnoxious,” and he is not ready to make up his mind yet about the matter in question.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1907-01-22
Thomas Collier Platt and Chauncey M. Depew appear in 16th century theatrical costumes in a scene from a Shakespearean play. Caption: Falstaff Depew (to Prince Hal Platt) — I would to God thou and I knew where a commodity of good names were to be bought.–King Henry IV.
Week by week in his magazine Puck at this time, cartoonist Udo J. Keppler was proving himself to be America’s foremost political caricaturist, perhaps the superior of his father who founded Puck; yet he is relatively obscure to history. This example is not a mere excuse to festoon two ugly faces on the weekly’s cover, but Keppler made a salient point, as per usual, about his political targets.
Octogenarian Henry Gassaway Davis, as a runner, is attended by Arthur P. Gorman who is putting a bandage on Davis’s right knee.
An elderly woman labeled “Tariff Revision” angrily shakes her umbrella after being left standing on the railroad station platform as the “Republican Special” departs in a cloud of dust. Two men standing on the back of the last car are laughing at her.
William Jennings Bryan rides on a horse fashioned out of “The Commoner” newspapers, through a town, announcing that representatives of the reorganized Democratic Party were coming, drawing out old men brandishing weapons labeled “Populism, 16 to 1, Free Riot” and a drum labeled “Dead Issues.” An old man leans out a window waving a flag that states “Free Silver or Bust.” Includes verse based on “Paul Revere’s Ride.”
Thomas Collier Platt, with his young bride, passes through the gates to the “Oldboys’ Hymeneal Paradise” where they are greeted by a “Reception Committee” of several old men labeled “Depew, Potter, Dewey, Flagler, [and] Woodford” and their young wives.
Two old farmers talk on the platform at a train station. They are concerned about farm boys leaving the farms for the city, as well as mortgages being held by banks outside the local community. Caption: Uncle Josh — The boys won’t stay on the farms no more. / Uncle Silas — No; an’ you can hardly expect ’em to. Nowadays, even the mortgages don’t stay on the farms.
Increasingly at the time of Gallaway’s cartoon, when Puck hit upon a good humorous gag, the magazine was inclined to bounce the usual partisan cartoon. But even a commentary about country boys leaving for the big cities had subtexts of politics or social commentary. The reference here to mortgages being held by distant banks, but also the threats of foreclosures.
A young man wearing a robe sits in a chair by a window, reading a book. A young woman nurse is attending to him and an old man, the doctor, has arrived for a check-up. There are medicines on a table in the foreground. Caption: The Nurse — The Doctor has come to take your temperature. / The Convalescent — I suppose it’s all I have left.
This cartoon’s joke has little to do with a pretty nurse or a handsome patient, as might be assumed from many themes of the day. Rather, “taking” all he has left is a critique on the cost of doctors’ care, evidenced by the account-book on the table in the foreground.
A crowd of people wearing colonial dress gather around an old man who is firing off a cannon during the Fourth of July celebration, 1903.
In the first years of the new century, Puck subtly devoted less space and editorial attention to partisan politics, and more to humorous images, decorative covers, and social topics. The magazine was a full decade away from sublimating politics in a major fashion, and that decision might have been motivated by the disinclination to offend roughly have of its potential readership… but in any event the humorous and decorative artwork, and non-political themes, were asserting themselves on Puck‘s covers especially.
An old woman labeled “Democratic Party” stands in the “Democratic Intelligence Bureau” managed by “J.K. Jones” who is sitting behind a desk. She is “looking for help” and taking a good look at several prospective candidates, from left: David B. Hill “No objection to dirty work,” William Jennings Bryan “Used to waiting,” Richard Olney “Old but regular,” Edward M. Shepard “Will do anything,” Alton B. Parker “Neat and quiet,” and Arthur P. Gorman “Willing and obliging.”
A common theme of the time among political cartoonists, even Democrat cartoonists, is the weak field of national candidates. In Pughe’s variation, this Puck cartoon pictures the old-maid Democrat lady looking for household help — a presidential candidate for the following year.
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.
An old woman labeled “Democratic Party” turns a wheelbarrow to dump politicians labeled “Bryan, Olney, Gorman, Hill, Shepard, [and] Johnson” into a sandpit labeled the “Democratic Dumping Ground” where only the feet of other, previously discarded, Democrats are visible.
What makes this cartoon particularly interesting to students of history is that the cartoonist Pughe was not criticizing Democrats from “across the aisle” or from an adversarial point of view. Puck Magazine was Democratic, and beseeched its own leaders, or moss-bound leaders of recent years, to clean house. Except for Grover Cleveland, there had been no Democratic president since before the Civil War. It is interesting that the cartoonist did not even label the politicians’ issues that failed to excite voters (free trade, bimetallism, anti-expansion), suggesting the leaders themselves had worn out their welcomes. Even Tom Johnson, reform mayor of Cleveland, is among the deplorables in Pughe’s cartoon.
An elderly couple remembers Christmas Eve with their children or possibly as children.
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1902-12-03
An elderly couple embarks on a leisurely grand tour of Europe, stopping in Ireland, Scotland, France, Germany, and Egypt, before returning home exhausted and in poor health from the activity and stress of travel.
Ehrhart’s theme and cartoon vignettes echoed the idea behind the very successful cartoon series in Life Magazine by Charles Dana Gibson only two years before, “The Education of Mr. Pipp.” In that series of cartoons, Mr. Pipp also had to deal with a flirtatious wife and three beautiful and eligible daughters as they “did the Tour” — traveled around Europe.
A prim elderly woman admonishes a tramp lying on the ground next to a dirt road on the outskirts of a rural community. Caption: Mrs. Stern — Why don’t you brace up and be a man and take the place in society to which you are entitled? / Languid Lannigan (yawning) — Aw! Ping-pong is sich a bore don’t yer know!
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1902-06-04
A local hunter appears in the foreground, and a visiting hunter from the city in the background asks the local if there is good shooting in the area. The local replies that it depends on who is doing it. Caption: Citiman — There is good shooting around her, isn’t there? / Native — Sure! – Of course it depends on who does it!
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1901-11-20
A tourist from the city stands on the steps of a railroad passenger car, speaking to an old man and a young boy standing on the platform at a train station in a quiet community known as “Restville.” A man with a heavy beard and smoking a pipe is leaning against the wall of the station. Another man sitting in a chair appears to be asleep. Caption: The Tourist. — Rather quiet here, isn’t it? Leading Citizen (of Restville). — Quiet? – why, say, even the unexpected don’t happen here!
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
1901-06-26
President Roosevelt informs Representative Gaines that he does not like to appoint judges over the age of sixty. He would like to make an exception for Judge John Allison, but believes it is unwise.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1908-04-14
President Roosevelt asks Justice John Marshall Harlan if he thinks Judge Alfred S. Moore is too advanced in age for the position in question.
Library of Congress Manuscript Division
1905-10-22
President William H. Taft, as a young boy, kneels on the arm of a rocking chair and leans over to put his arms around the shoulders of an elderly woman, labeled “Ultimate Consumer,” who is knitting a large sock.
With a strangely sinister smile on his face, the lad representing the new president, William H. Taft, almost overwhelms his Granny in her rocking chair. She represents the consumer, a class that was continually pictured as worried about the possibility of a rise in the cost of living.