Every Day Is Special: cartoon

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May 9 - First Cartoon in Franklin's Newspaper

Posted on May 9, 2022

This is an update of my post published on May 9, 2011:

What is a cartoon? I bet you already know that answer...

….Or do you?

The word cartoon comes from Italian and Dutch words for heavy paper. A cartoon used to be a preparatory drawing made (on heavy paper) before starting a tapestry, fresco, stained glass window, or painting.

The term evolved to mean humorous illustrations printed in newspapers and magazines. (We more commonly call them comics now.)

The word cartoon is most used these days to mean animated television shows.

Many early newspaper cartoons were not meant to be funny. Instead, they were meant to make a point—often a political point. We call these sorts of illustrations political cartoons. That's the case with this first American cartoon, published on this day in 1754 in Benjamin Franklin's newspaper The Pennsylvania Gazette. It showed a snake that was divided into eight pieces, and the caption read “JOIN, or DIE.” Can you imagine what the cartoon meant?

Hint: notice the initials next to each snake “bit.”

Second hint: Remember, there was no such thing as the United States in 1754. Instead, there was a series of British colonies up and down the coast of North America.

I think Franklin was warning people that the British colonies should unite together under one government, or they will not be strong enough to survive. The eight sections of the snake were (in order from the head to the tail) New England, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina. Notice that there were four colonies (Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire) in New England, and Franklin left Delaware and Georgia out of the cartoon! Apparently one of these being awfully small and one of them a new colony, Franklin didn't consider that they would be much help with defense.

A later (1775) version of Franklin's Join Or Die cartoon
appeared with Georgia included...

At the time that Franklin ran the cartoon in his newspaper, the colonies were in danger from French colonists to the north and from Indians. Franklin had proposed a union under the Albany Plan—and this cartoon was a quick visual argument for why others should go along with his plan. The cut-up snake became quite popular and was re-used and re-drawn many times. As a matter of fact, it's still current: A punk rock group named Sons of Liberty used the picture and caption for an album called “Join or Die,” and The Late Late Show host Craig Ferguson has the cartoon tattooed on the inside of one of his forearms!

Check out some more historical political cartoons at Harp Week, and current cartoons at Daryl Cagle's website.

Also on this date:

Lost Sock Memorial Day

Archeologist Howard Carter's birthday

Peter Pan author J. M. Barrie's birthday

Anniversary of the first laser beam to the moon

**Anniversary of the death of Opus sculptor**

Birthday of author / illustrator Eleanor Estes

Liberation Day in Guernsey and Jersey

Anniversary of the Consecration of Lincoln Cathedral

Europe Day

Heroes' Day in Moldova

Plan ahead:

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September 25 - Happy Birthday, Shel Silverstein

Posted on September 25, 2018

Today's famous birthday was a writer - a poet - a cartoonist !

Some of his books are really famous, for kids' books...and really, really famous, for kids' poetry books! Here are three you may have heard of:

The Giving Tree is a story; the book has sold more than 5 million copies, has been translated into more than 30 languages, and has appeared on countless lists of "best children's books" and the like.

A Light in the Attic is a collection of poems.

And Where the Sidewalk Ends is an earlier (and I believe more famous) collection of poems.

Born on this date in 1930, in Chicago, Illinois, Silverstein started to draw at a young age, and he was bad enough at sports that he used writing and drawings as an outlet as a teenager.

Silverstein was expelled from a university, and when he tried to go to art school instead, that was interrupted by him being drafted into the U.S. Army. But that's okay, since he later said that college had been a waste of time for him. He said that the money he spent on tuition would have been better spent traveling the world, meeting people.

And of course military service often allows people to travel. Silverstein served in Japan and Korea and had many cartoons published in a military newspaper.

When he got home from the Army, he sold hot dogs at a ballpark, but he also submitted cartoons to magazines. One magazine sent him around the world to write about and cartoon-illustrate his adventures! So that was another chance to REALLY educate himself.

Of course, soon Silverstein started writing books and being published and becoming popular and famous and even beloved! Although he is most famous as a children's author and poet, he has also written songs and stories for TV and for theater. One of his most famous songs, "A Boy Named Sue," was recorded by Johnny Cash and earned Silverstein a Grammy Award.

Did you know...?

Silverstein cared a lot about books as physical objects. He felt that they had to be printed on the right paper - the right size, color, shape, and feel of paper. He didn't allow paperback editions of most of his books because they wouldn't have been printed on as good a quality of paper.
Silverstein's books are surprisingly controversial. For example, some people think that The Giving Tree is about a super positive relationship, and others feel it is about a terrible relationship. Many people have interpretations of it - it's about humans and the environment, it's about children and parents, it's about humans and God, it's about friendship. Some people even insist that it is satire.

You're probably thinking, "Well, what did Shel Silverstein
mean to say with The Giving Tree? But Silverstein had a strict rule about never explaining what he'd written.

Some of Silverstein's poems are controversial. Like, how many parents want their kids to read "How Not to Have to Dry the Dishes"? The book A Light in the Attic has been banned from so many libraries and schools, it appears on the "100 Most Frequently Challenged Books" list.