What's Shakin', Johnny Canuck?

Today's Graphical History Tour pays another visit to our neighbor to the north. Understanding Johnny Canuck will become increasingly important if we Yanks intend to welcome Canada as our 51st state.

Or declare war on them. Whatever.

"Enter March, 1925" by A.G. Racey in Montreal Daily Star, March 1, 1925

March, 1925 came in with an earthquake centered in the Charlevoix/Kamouraska seismic zone of southern Quebec at 9:21 the night of Saturday, February 28. Measuring 6.3 magnitude, it caused significant damage to buildings, widespread panic, but no fatalities. It was one of the strongest earthquakes ever to hit eastern Canada, and was felt as far away as La Crosse, Wisconsin and Florence, South Carolina.

"Coolidge's Common Sense Policy" by A.G. Racey in Montreal Daily Star, March 3, 1925

When we last took a gander at Arthur G. Racey's cartoons, he was casting aspersions aplenty across the line; but he greeted the inauguration of Calvin Coolidge with this cartoon recommending the American President's policies to Liberal Party Canadian Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King.

Racey, a Conservative Party stalwart, had little affection for King, seen here peering over the wall at Coolidge and his woodpile of waste and expensive deadwood. 

Imagine if Coolidge could have been equipped with a chainsaw instead of an axe! He'd have had time to make that wall taller, then tear it down, then build it up again, and down, and up...

"Has His Eye on It" by A.G. Racey in Montreal Daily Star,  March 30, 1925

By the end of the month, Coolidge was the one peering over Racey's fence, envious of a Scotsman's reputation for parsimony. If there was an actual World Thrift Championship in March, 1925, I have not been able to find contemporary news reports of it.

"What Is He Saying" by A.G. Racey in Montreal Daily Star, March 4, 1925

Racey could easily have chosen to take offense at a February 24 speech at a Women's Conference on National defense and Peace Insurance in Washington D.C. by U.S. Navy Rear Admiral William Phelps, but chose to use the occasion to highlight the alliance between the U.S. and the British Empire. Racey's cartoon paraphrases Phelps: "An Anglo-American War is in sight. It can only be prevented by a strong U.S. Navy."

Phelps's address, given with Coolidge’s Secretaries of War and State in attendance, came amid debate in Washington whether to boost defense construction of battleships or aircraft. His views reflected the isolationist views ascendant in U.S. politics, as well as the Anglophobic drumbeat of William Randolph Hearst's media empire:

"One of the primary objectives of the League of Nations, under the leadership of England, is to devise some policy to destroy the American favorable balance of trade. ... There are serious differences brewing between England and the United States over shipping policies. These differences can be prevented from developing into a conflict only by a strong American Navy. That America determines to build up a great merchant marine fleet has created against us the bitter animosity of the English shipping interests."

"The Wasp's Nest" by Sam Hunter in Toronto Star Daily, March 3, 1925

Phelps's superiors quickly distanced themselves from the Rear Admiral's remarks, and Toronto cartoonist Sam Hunter joined A.G. Racey in downplaying their significance. 

The Daily Gleaner of Frederickton, New Brunswick, editorialized on March 3: "We have no doubt [Phelps] succeeded in keeping his audience awake. For the rest, we surmise that the 'brew' came from a brainstorm or something stronger than salt water."

"Whatcha Mean If" by James B. Fitzmaurice in Vancouver Daily Province, March 5, 1925

Suffice it to say that Coolidge's inaugural address contained no such incendiary predictions of a return to the War of 1812. This cartoon by James B. Fitzmaurice leaves me wondering whether he found Coolidge's vision of world peace inspiring or merely quaint. Is this how culturally nice Canadians mock someone?

"Some Demander" by Sam Hunter in Toronto Star Weekly, March 7, 1925 

For a more forthright critique of American foreign relations, Sam Hunter mocks congressional demands that America's Entente allies step up their repayment of wartime U.S. loans. He also took a dim view of the U.S. prescribing its own European peace and reparations plan after refusing to participate in the League of Nations (the brainchild of an earlier U.S. President).

Opium was the fentanyl of the day. I do not, however, believe that the Coolidge administration or Republican Senate were blaming Canada specifically for the supply of opium to the United States, the way that the present maladministration and Congress pretend is the issue from up north. 

Back to Mr. Racey...

"And Easy to Make It So" by A.G. Racey in Montreal Star, March 19, 1925

Here's another Yankee innovation Racey thought Canadians should emulate: Daylight Saving Time. From the standpoint of keeping Québec and New York in the same time zone, it must have made a great deal of sense to him. He might also have been intrigued by the prospect of daylight hours extending even further into the evening than we're used to south of the border.

Those of us still straining to get used to waking up an hour earlier every morning since springing ahead last Sunday might beg to differ that Daylight Saving Time makes everybody happy, however.

Now, lest you think Racey was going entirely soft on the Yanks:

"Such a Fine Business Proposition" by A.G. Racey in Montreal Daily Star, March 6, 1925

Racey remained suspicious of U.S. designs on Canada's electricity and lumber, as you surely remember from this stop on the Graphical History Tour.

"Super Power" in this cartoon refers to U.S. Commerce Secretary Herbert Hoover's proposal to eliminate barriers to interstate transmission of electricity, supplemented as well by power lines bringing in hydroelectricity generated in Quebec and Ontario. 

Racey may also have had in mind efforts by a Chicago speculator who had bought controlling interest in numerous electric companies across the U.S. and was interested in acquiring Canadian power companies as well. To counter the Chicagoan, two Montreal stockbrokers founded The Power Company of Canada in April, 1925 to consolidate Canada's many regional power companies.

In case you're ever asked, the United States is the leading consumer of lumber in North America, and Canada is the leading supplier: Canada supplied roughly 30% of the lumber used in the United States last year. The four largest North American softwood lumber producers operate in both countries.

Little did A.G. Racey suspect that 100 years later, that electrical power and lumber would become a weapon in Canada's battle to fend off United States hegemony.

The February Revolution

"Sic Transit Gloria" in Novy Satirikon, Petrograd (St. Petersburg, Russia), March, 1917

This March marks the 100th anniversary of the February Revolution in Russia. (Czarist Russia still adhered to the Julian calendar, which by 1917 had fallen 13 days behind the Gregorian calendar in use in much of Europe, European colonies, and the Americas. Ponder that while you're springing ahead one measly hour tonight.)

A series of workers' strikes and protests against food shortages beginning in early February grew in size, bringing industrial and commercial activity in the capital to a near complete standstill by March 10 (a.k.a. February 25). With much of his army tied up with the war in Europe, Tsar Nicholas II had only a residual force of green or injured soldiers available to quell the demonstrations, and many troops proved unable or unwilling to do so. Troops began to mutiny, and demonstrations grew into riots.

"The Sceptre" by Oscar Cesare in New York Evening Post, March 16, 1917

Attempting to return to Petrograd, Nicholas was arrested by revolutionaries on March 14 (March 1) and abdicated the throne on behalf of himself and his son Alexei the next day. Nicholas nominated his brother, the Grand Duke Michael Alexandrovich, as his successor; but Michael saw that the situation was hopeless and declined the crown.

"By Divine Right of the People" by Jones in Boston Journal, March 14, 1917

The center-left provisional government of the Russian Duma and the more radical Petrograd Soviet would spend the next eight months wrestling for power; but for now, it appeared to be a victory for democracy. Among American editorial cartoonists, there was near unanimous approval of the overthrow of the tsar.

"The New Boss of the House" by Wm. Hanny in St. Joseph (Mo,) News Press, March 15, 1917

If it could happen in Russia, C.F. Naughton wondered, where else could popular revolt throw off the shackles of their imperialist overlords?

"Even Russia Wins Liberty" by C.F. Naughton in Duluth Evening Herald, March 17, 1917

John "Ding" Darling imagines that the Russian revolution might even inspire the German people to shake off their own monarchy. After all, "Czar/Tsar" and "Kaiser" derive from the same Latin root!

"Come Off That Fence" by Jay "Ding" Darling in New York Tribune, March 16, 1917

Judging from the cartoons allowed by the German censors, the German government wasn't terribly worried.

"The Czar's Plaything" in Lustige Blätter, Berlin, March 26, 1917

On the cover of Lustige Blätter a month later, the Russian revolutionaries look positively heroic:

"Die Hungerrevolution" (The Hunger Revolution) by Ernst Heilemann in Lustige Blätter, Berlin, April 23, 1917 

Set Your Clocks Back 100 Years

Welcome once again to Springback Saturday, with breaking news from a century ago. The Christian Science Monitor of May 23, 1916, takes front page note of a newfangled "scheme" just underway in Great Britain:

LONDON, England, Monday - Pleasantly named, the Summer Time Act was initiated yesterday morning, and though in the morning comparatively few reaped benefit, the evening showed the advantage of the scheme originated by Mr. Willett. The evening went on and on and at 10 o'clock, summer time, or at 9 o'clock old time, it was still light; some persons realized then the economy of the arrangement which shortens by an hour all over the country, in private houses, offices, factories, etc. the use of fuel and artificial light. Of yesterday's 23 hours in London, 13 were on record as bright sunshine.
The change of official clocks in many cases was made at the time prescribed by the act, 2 a.m. old time, yesterday morning.
Business firms in many instances stole the hour from the sun when closing Saturday for the week end and in Kingsway three clocks recorded three different times, one individual having done in May what he should do in September. Shortly before 2 a.m. the minute hands of Big Ben raced round 66 feet and the hour hand round five feet of clock surface in record time, little notice being taken of the feat, since Big Ben does not strike at present.
In government and other offices with night staffs the pace of the sun was quickened at the same time, while, generally speaking, clocks in railway stations and factories and elsewhere were changed between midnight and 2 a.m. old time. The general public put their watches on overnight, excepting those who forgot to do so.
Morning services were well attended, though a number of persons arrived as services were finishing.
Yesterday and today are beautiful summer days, and no better could have been selected to show the benefits of the Willett scheme and to prove the truth of the poet's maxim that the best of all ways to lengthen our days is to steal a few hours from the night. 

The Mr. Willett mentioned in the article was builder William Willett, who wasn't the first person to propose Daylight Saving Time, but advocated strenuously for it from 1905 until his death in 1915, upset at never having enough time in the evening to get in a complete round of golf. Parliament took up the idea in 1908, although it never got anywhere until World War I upped the ante by crimping the coal supply.

As this diagram from the May 28, 1916 Philadelphia Inquirer points out, the Axis Powers had already been employing Sommerzeit since the beginning of the month. Both sides of the Great War returned to "old time" on September 30, which was nice and considerate of everybody. It wouldn't have been sporting for one side to continue waking up an hour ahead of the other.

Since this blog is supposed to be about cartoons, here's John McCutcheon's cartoon about Daylight Saving Time for the Chicago Tribune on May 23, 1916:

Little could he know that 100 years later, we'd be rousing ourselves out of bed in the dark in March and November, burning up those savings on the gas and electric bill. 

McCutcheon's cartoon is arguing in favor of a newfangled idea, which generally isn't great fodder for an editorial cartoon. We're much better at poking fun or expressing outrage at things through reductio ad absurdum, taking ideas to their logical extreme. If we're in favor of an idea, we ridicule the alternative. Sticking with telling time the way we always had, however, hardly seems open to lampoon or exaggeration.

I did try hunting up a cartoon with a more skeptical view of Daylight Saving Time; but with the race for the Republican presidential nomination wrapping up, the Punitive Expedition in Mexico bogging down, and the ever-present issue of Preparedness dragging on, I guess most American cartoonists thought there were more pressing things to draw about that week.

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P.S.: You may have noticed the Monitor headline about "equal suffrage for Porto Rico." No, the House was not endorsing statehood for the American territorial possession, but that women there should have the same voting rights as Puerto Rican men.