Supernatural

Theodore Roosevelt, as Hercules, wears a lion skin and holds a sword. He faces a nine-headed hydra, with each head identified as that of a senator. The hydra’s tail is labeled “U.S. Senate.”

comments and context

Comments and Context

In an earlier time, such as when this cartoon in Puck appeared, average people were conversant with elements of Western intellectual heritage like Greek mythology. The contextual background of this political cartoon by J. S Pughe might have been evident to many readers in 1905. In one of ancient Athens’ most durable myths, the Second Task of Hercules was to conquer the multi-headed monster Hydra.

Theodore Roosevelt enjoyed the account of L. H. Mosier’s experience with a tiger. He found the account believable and sees nothing supernatural or miraculous about the event.

Collection

Library of Congress Manuscript Division

Creation Date

1916-02-03

A gigantic man labeled “Free Silverite,” with the wings of a bat and the tail of a dragon, emerges from a dark forest carrying papers that state “Free Silver and Repudiation.” He is bearing down on a small knight labeled “United Sound Money Party” who is carrying a large sword labeled “Votes.” Caption: And as sound money stands at rest, / The Jabberwock, upon the run, / Comes whiffling from the Wooly West, / Burbling “Sixteen to One!” / One, two! – One, two! – and through and through, / Sound Money’s sword goes snicker-snack; – / He’ll leave it dead, and with its head, / He’ll go galumphing back. With Puck’s acknowledgments to the author of “Alice In Wonderland,” and Sir John Tenniel.

Collection

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs

Creation Date

1896-07-29

A beautiful, partially nude, winged woman rescues an airman who has fallen out of an airplane, and gives him a kiss. Caption: An airmaid to the rescue!

Collection

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs

Creation Date

1910-12-14

Print shows the “Light of Reason” shining from the upper right, illuminating bust portraits of “Johannes Kepler, I. Kant, Th. Paine, Jefferson, B. de Spinoza, Franklin, Voltaire, E. H. Haeckel, Tyndall, Huxley, [and] Darwin.” The light is blocked by a large umbrella labeled “Bigotry, Supernaturalism, [and] Fanaticism,” behind which are hiding various members of the clergy, including the Pope, Henry Ward Beecher, and T. De Witt Talmage. In the upper left, a vignette shows three female figures around an infant in a crib, with caption “God made Man and Endowed him with Free Will, Memory, and Understanding.” In the lower right is another vignette showing the Pope and other members of the clergy torturing a man, filling him with “Superstition,” with caption, “But it took a Deal of Altering in the Man before he could be made a ‘Good Citizen’.”

Collection

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs

Creation Date

1882-03-08

Thomas A. Hendricks, Abram S. Hewitt, Charles A. Dana, and Henry Watterson are pictured as nymphs in women’s clothing attempting to coax Samuel J. Tilden as a faun into water labeled “Presidential Waters.” Already in the water, in the background, is Thomas F. Bayard.

Collection

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs

Creation Date

1883-08-22

A four-headed, eight-armed monster, formed out of the upper torsos of James J. Hill, Edward Henry Harriman, J. Pierpont Morgan, and George Jay Gould, juggles New York State and municipal services and federal influence in Congress, while stepping on a red liberty cap. Three diminutive figures stand in the left foreground: the center figure represents Theodore Roosevelt, the one on the left is labeled “You,” and the one on the right is labeled “Me.” Caption: Messrs. Hill, Harriman, Morgan and Gould, sole managers and proprietors.

comments and context

Comments and Context

Udo J. Keppler’s center-spread drawing in Puck is a rare example of the magazine presenting a political cartoon not on a specific issue or policy debate. As a generic observation of the “current situation,” it speaks to history as an iconic representation of the truth, and not merely a cartoonist’s truth.

A huge red flying creature labeled “Wickersham,” holding a fork with webbing in one hand and papers labeled “Trust, Dissolution, Sherman Law, [and] Disintegration” in the other, descends on fleeing crowds of men on a city street, possibly Wall Street.

Collection

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs

Creation Date

1911-10-18