Our Foreign Desk

"The World 'Do' Move" by Dean O'Dell in Dayton Daily News, May 18, 1926

This week's Graphical History Tour takes a quick look overseas to catch up with events in the rest of the world in May of 1926.

Well, Europe and North Africa, at least.

"Rolling Up His Sleeves" by Fred Ellis in Daily Worker, Chicago, May 5, 1926

That May started off with a general strike in Great Britain, to the alarm of commie-fearing cartoonists, but to the delight of their cohorts at the Daily Worker. 

An editorial in London Daily Mail called the general strike revolutionary and subversive, sparking a walk-out by its pressmen.

"A May Day Moving That Will Move" by Arthur G. Racey in Montreal Daily Star, May 1, 1926

The U.S. had a hand in exacerbating issues for British miners. It its effort to stabilize the German economy, the Dawes Plan for Europe subsidized Germany's coal industry; that in turn enabled Germany to provide free coal to France and Italy under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles. As a result of this and overvaluation of the Pound Sterling, British coal exports plummeted and miners' pay was slashed by 35%.

"I Always Bring Trouble" by Daniel Fitzpatrick in St. Louis Post-Dispatch, May 6, 1926

Meanwhile, working conditions in British coal mines were still basically pre-industrial. Whereas German and Polish mining firms had invested in mechanization, the British companies relied exclusively on manual labor.

"Why the Strikes" by T.E. Powers in New York Evening Journal, ca. May 8, 1926

Miners laid down their tools on May 1; the Trade Union Congress (TUC) called on all other workers to join them beginning at midnight May 3. 1.5 million workers from all over Great Britain joined the strike on the first day.

"Streik in England" by Wilhelm Schulz in Simplicissimus, Munich/Stuttgart, May 24, 1926

In response, the government sent police to escort busloads of strikebreakers to the mines and other affected industries, and posted troops at bus stations to ward off violent resistance. London's bus system was immediately overwhelmed. After a week or so, some striking workers began breaking the picket lines. Historian Jessica Brain takes it from there:

"The turning point came when the general strike was identified as not being protected by the Trade Dispute Act of 1906, except for the coal industry, meaning that the unions became liable for the intention to breach contracts. By 12th May, the TUC General Council met at Downing Street, to announce that the strike was being called off with the agreement that no striker would be victimised for their decision, despite the government stating it had no control over employers’ decisions.

"The momentum had been lost, unions faced potential legal action and workers were returning to their place of employment. Some miners continued to resist for as long as November, but to no avail.

"Many miners faced unemployment for years whilst others had to accept the bad conditions of lower wages and longer working hours. Despite incredible levels of support, the strike had amounted to nothing.

"The Sincerest of Flattery" by Dorman H. Smith for Newspaper Enterprise Assn., ca. May 22, 1926

"In 1927 the Trade Disputes Act was introduced by [Prime Minister] Stanley Baldwin, an act which banned any sympathy strikes as well as mass picketing; this act is still in force today. This was the final nail in the coffin for those workers who had taken part in one of the biggest events in industrial history in Britain."

"Gehnsucht" by Arthur Krüger in Kladderadatsch, Berlin, June 6, 1926

On May 11, Poland's former Chief of State, First Marshal Józef Klemens Piłsudski, launched a successful coup d'état against the newly elected Polish government of President Stanisław Wojciechowski and Prime Minister Wincenty Witos, the third administration in the previous six months.

"Polen" by Ernst Thöny in Simplicissimus, Munich/Stuttgart, May 31, 1926

Units of the Army loyal to Piłsudski quickly seized control of the major bridges in Warsaw. The Polish Socialist Party called for a general strike in support of the coup. The Railwaymen's Union brought transportation and communications to a standstill, and the government surrendered on May 14 to prevent further bloodshed.

"Clean-up Week Idea Reaches Poland" by Wm. Hanny in Philadelphia Inquirer,May 27, 1926

At first blush, Hanny's cartoon appears to side with the coup, but he was actually referring to the name given to the new government by its principal leader. Piłsudski announced the creation of what he called a moral "Sanation" (Sanacja) dictatorship. In English newspaper reports:

"Marshal Pilsudski has stated that the policy of the Government immediately is for the restoration of the authority of the State and the introduction of administrative reforms, including the suppression of corruption in public life. He promises to hold a general election after the dissolution of Parliament. In the meantime he claims that only Presidential endorsement shall be required in order to enforce the law. He declares that his sole desire is to save Poland from the reaction of military operations which are not directed against the State or the people. I am, he said, fighting the Government, which since it assumed office has inaugurated a policy of defiance to the interests of the State and the army."

"Pan Pilsudki Imitating Senor Mussolini" possibly by Viktor "Deni" Denisov in Pravda, Moscow, ca. May 22, 1926

The Daily Worker gave no credit for this cartoon, so I am guessing its creator based on the style of the drawing (and overlooking the Roman rather than Cyrillic alphabet on Piłsudski's banner, which might have been used for a variety of reasons).

"Pilsudsky's In the Saddle But Where's the Horse" by J.N. "Ding" Darling in Des Moines Register, May 29, 1926

"Ding" Darling offered a different view of the Polish coup, but the anonymous cartoonist above hit closer to the mark. While Piłsudski never assumed a role as the titular head of state, he remained the real power behind the Polish government until his death in 1935.

Moving on:

"Frühlingslied in Morokko" by Werner Hahmann in Kladderadatsch, Berlin, May 30. 1926

Moroccan rebel leader Abd el-Krim surrendered to Spanish and French forces on May 27, 1926, bringing an end to the five-year-long Rif War (which we have been following here, here, here, and here) and the Al-Jumhūriyyah al-Rif. 

by Daniel Fitzpatrick in St. Louis Post-Dispatch, May 27, 1926

Despite some early successes against the Spanish army, el-Krim’s 9,000 to 13,000 guerillas were no match for the Europeans once France entered the war in support of Spain in September, 1925. Spanish forces re-occupied el-Krim’s home base of Ajdir that October; by March, 1926, the Franco-Spanish armies had gained control of most of Morocco.

"The Triumph" by Ed Gale in Los Angeles Times, May 28, 1926

El-Krim sued for peace in April; but talks collapsed, and the Europeans resumed hostilities. El-Krim was left with no option but to surrender to the French, who promised his safety and that of his family in exchange for the safe return of Spanish and French prisoners of war. El-Krim lived out the rest of his days in exile on Réunion in the Indian Ocean.

"Abd-el-Krim" by Ernst Thöny in Simplicissimus, Munich/Stuttgart, June 21, 1926

As far as some Americans were concerned, the principal outcome of the Europeans' victory was that France could now focus her attention on her dismal economic situation. And, by the way, repaying those wartime debts to the U.S.

"A Stitch in Time—Maybe" by Cecil Jensen in Los Angeles Illustrated Daily News, May 28, 1926

Flights of Frozen Fancy

This week's Graphical History Tour celebrates the 100th anniversary of the first flights over the North Pole by people who weren't puffins.

"Over the Top" by Edmund Duffy in Baltimore Sun, May 11, 1926

U.S. newspapers excitedly reported that Admiral Richard E. Byrd became the first explorer to fly over the North Pole on May 9, 1926. Byrd and pilot Floyd Bennett announced that they had flown their tri-motor monoplane, the Josephine Ford (named after Edsel Ford's daughter) from Spitsbergen, Norway, circling the pole in a nearly 16-hour flight.

According to Byrd's account written for the New York Times and St. Louis Post-Dispatch:

"I took my calculations and found that we were at the Pole. We reached it at 9:04 Greenwich time, just about the hour we had hoped to get there. Bennett and I shook hands simply, and went back to the cabin, stood at attention and saluted for Admiral Peary. The Navy had reached the pole again, the blessed old Navy. I did not drop an American flag. Peary had done that.

"The ice and snow were similar to that which Peary had described, but the ice was not the same as in the polar sea. There it is in constant motion. It was slightly rougher here than it had been when I first described it, but criss crossed in the same way.

"We flew several miles further, circled and then took some still and motion pictures. As we flew there at the top of the world, circumnavigating it in a few minutes' of flight, I regretted that we had not found land, and that our leaky oil tank would prevent our returning by way of Cape Morris-Jessup."

"The Eagle Over the Pole" by Wm. A. Rogers in Washington Post, May 11, 1926

Byrd was an instant American Hero in the press, and editorial cartoonists rushed to crank out jingoistic cartoons, most of them very similar to each other.

"Our Private Flag Pole" by Roy James in St. Louis Star, May 11, 1926

Aside from the flags and eagles, a commonality that strikes me in these cartoons is that nearly all of them show North Pole as a huge inverted icicle, rather than the barber pole that I think of as cartoon cliché. This is only a guess, but the striped pole with the ball on top must have been popularized later.

"The First Over the Top" by John T. McCutcheon in Chicago Tribune, May 11, 1926

John McCutcheon celebrated the news of Byrd's flight as a relief from all the dismal news he was typically faced with — although by bringing up political scandals, wars in Morocco and Syria, labor strife in London, a riot in Paris, and a rum-running ring in New York, McCutcheon was being the wet blanket at the party himself.

"The Hurdle Race" by Dean O'Dell in Dayton Daily News, May 13, 1926

Meanwhile, Norwegian aviator Roald Amundsen was also heading for the North Pole in a semi-rigid airship christened the Norge. The Italian-made airship was delayed by weather on each leg of its journey from Rome, but eventually headed north from Vadsø, Norway on May 11 with a crew of 18 men and one dog.

"Fremdenverkehr" by Arthur Johnson in Kladderadatsch, Berlin, May 30, 1926

The Norge crossed the North Pole at 1:25 a.m. GMT on May 12, dropping U.S., Norwegian, and Italian flags onto the ice. In Amundsen's account published by the New York Times and St. Louis Post-Dispatch:

"[W]e went down to a low height, slowed the engines, and [engineer/financier Lincoln] Ellsworth, [pilot Umberto] Nobile and myself dipped our countries' flags. We mounted banners on steel-pointed rods. These rods we steered vertically into the ice as we dropped them, and they remained standing. The crew took their caps off during the ceremony, and it was a beautiful sight to see the flags standing against the glittering snow."

I have colorized the flags in Arthur Johnson's cover cartoon; the copy scanned by the University of Heidelberg appears to have faded considerably. His version of the Norwegian flag somewhat resembles the obsolete Norway-Sweden union flag, except that the faded blue broken bar that I have darkened ought to be yellow, and a black cross in that quadrant of the flag is missing altogether. 

The airship, its propellers damaged by shards of ice during its flight, suffered further damage as it landed at Teller, Alaska. It was dismantled there, short of its announced goal of Nome, and shipped back to Italy; it was never repaired.

"Die 'Norge' Zurück" by Wilhelm Schulz in Simplicissimus, Munich, June 7, 1926

Wilhelm Schulz lampoons Italy's involvement in the flight of the Norge, and perhaps the fate of the airplane itself, depicting an expedition member presenting Benito Mussolini with a helmetful of melted ice. 

Italian hubris over its part in the journey was a valid target for satire. Somewhat contrary to his newspaper account, Amundsen was peeved that the Italian flag dropped at the pole by Nobile was larger than the Norwegian and American flags, and that Nobile continued to drop so many other flags that Amundsen later complained of Nobile turning the Norge "a circus wagon of the skies." Mussolini sent Nobile on a speaking tour of the United States to tout the genius of Italian engineering, putting Amundsen's nose further out of joint.

"Amundsen am Nordpol" by Oskar Garvens in Kladderadatsch, Berlin, May 30, 1926

In German cartoons, at any rate, Amundsen was the star of the show. Berlin cartoonist Garvens gave us something other than an inverted icicle at the north pole: some sort of pepper-, nut-, or coffee-grinder.

As for the caption, it must be a play on the name of Admiral Byrd. My best, albeit wild guess is that un-byrdlich might be a pun on unberührt, untouched; while that might explain the open tin and the eaten sardines, that cactus remains a mystery.

"Another of the Great Silent Places Opens to the Tourist" by J.N. "Ding" Darling in Des Moines Register, May 11, 1926

"Ding" Darling's cartoon makes a similar point for us English-speaking readers. The aviators in the cartoon have left behind not just empty sardine tins, but also empty Uneeda Biscuit boxes, a spent campfire, and graffiti on the pole itself, while planning to "bring the folks up here some day for a picnic."

"Men Must Be Men to Wrestle with Me" by Ernest R. McTaggart in Vancouver Daily Province, British Columbia, May 15, 1926

I am duty-bound to point out that the general consensus since Admiral Byrd's death in 1957 is that he could not possibly have flown his trimotor monoplane, with its maximum speed of 85 mph, from Spitsbergen to the North Pole and back in sixteen hours. 

There is evidence that his flight records were erased and modified. Yet even though doubts of Byrd's claims were raised not long after he landed, he was still awarded the National Medal of Honor and celebrated with a New York ticker tape parade.

Then, Tomorrow Was Another Day

Today's Graphical History Tour checks out the international scene in March of 1926, which means that we won't be seeing much from U.S. cartoonists. The Yanks weren't particularly interested in the outside world just then, although that doesn't mean that there was nothing going on. 

"Was Haben Wir von dem Grösser Mannern" by Werner Hahmann in Kladderadatsch, Berlin, March 7, 1926

For one thing, world leaders were still trying to hammer out arms reduction agreements, in accoradance with the Treaty of Versailles that ended World War I. Werner Hahmann here anticipated how the leaders of Italy, France, the U.S., Great Britain, U.S.S.R., and Germany would approach the summit (to use a term that came into use much later) about to get underway.

You should be familiar with Benito Mussolini and Calvin Coolidge, but Americans may not be familiar with the rest of these faces. Aristide Briand was Prime Minister of France off and on from 1909 to 1929; nobody warmed that seat for very long at a time in the 1920's. Austen Chamberlain was British Foreign Secretary, and Nobel Peace Prize laureate with Briand and Germany's Gustav Stresemann for negotiating the Locarno Treaty settling Germany's western border.

Georgy Chicherin was the U.S.S.R. People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs, and I have no clue what Hahmann's reference to whistling was about. Chicherin, having been arrested in England for antiwar activity when Russia's October Revolution took place, promoted a pro-German, anti-British foreign policy; so I imagine that in spite of Kladderadatsch's opposition to communism, Hahmann regarded Chicherin as a relatively benign presence.

Hans Luther was Chancellor of Germany from January, 1925 to May, 1926. Kladderadatsch's cartoonists must not have found him particularly inspiring, since time and time again, all they could come up with for cartoons about him was to have him quote Martin Luther's famous "Here I stand" statement.

"That's a Good Idee" by Wm. A. Rogers in Washington [DC] Post, March 24, 1926

I'm including one U.S. cartoonist here, isolationist W.A. Rogers, depicting U.S. participation in disarmament talks as something eagerly sought by European powers. His Uncle Sam would consider coming along strictly as a favor. Why, his "national defense" was merely a toy!

"You Can't Always Tell by the Picture on the Packet" by Sidney Strube in London Daily Express, ca. Mar. 21, 1926

London cartoonist Sidney Strube drew Uncle Sam kibitzing over the fence at Europe, whose packet of Locarno lily seeds has produced some strange flowers. "Say! Bo! That's funny stuff you are growing!"

"Der Gute Bruder aus dem Westen" by Werner Hahmann in Kladderadatsch, Berlin, March 7, 1926

U.S. interest in the disarmament conference was disingenuous, in Hahmann's view. In this cartoon, Uncle Same brings to the table "Huge strengthening of the American air fleet" and "new travel loans for America's navy."

"Deutschland im Võlkerbund" by Ernst Schilling in Simplicissimus, Stuttgart, March 1, 1926

Over at Simplicissimus, Ernst Schilling saw plenty of disingenuousness to go around among the disarmament negotiators. I don't believe any of the characters on the right side of the cartoon are caricatures of actual delegates (with the possible exception of the very British looking chap in the foreground), but I think that the presumably German man on the left looking askance at the rest must be.

"Umtriebe" by Arthur Krüger in Kladderadatsch, Berlin, March 7, 1926

The fellow in the foreground of Kruger's cartoon represented Poland, as identified by the czapka on his head. The cap became a symbol of Polish independence after the war, and was adopted as cartooning shorthand for that country, as Michel and Marianne were for Germany and France.

At issue here was whether to admit Germany into the League of Nations (Völkerbund in German), which Poland and France opposed.

"Der Taufbeken in Genf" by Arthur Johnson in Kladderadatsch, Berlin, March 7, 1926

The feeling was mutual: Arthur Johnson was among Germans who were also highly skeptical of joining the League, especially if despised Poland were a member as well.

"Auf in den Völkerbund" by Wilhelm Schulz in Simplicissimus, Stuttgart, March 15, 1926

Wilhelm Schulz's cartoon depicts Mussolini and Poland (ach du lieber! a drunkard, too!) conspiring to sabotage Germany's seat at the League of Nations table.

"Polen Beansprucht einen Festen Sitz im Völkerbund" by Richter in Kladderadatsch, Berlin, March 21, 1926

The Polish position, rather, was that if Germany were to have a permanent seat in the League, so should Poland.

"Versuchtes, aber Mißglücktes Falschspiel in Genf" by Oskar Garvens in Kladderadatsch, Berlin, March 21, 1926

Poland had the support of both Great Britain (you'll notice that Chamberlain's King of Spades is wearing a czapka) and France, with treaties obliging both to come to its aid if attacked.  

"Mißglücktes Experiment" by Arthur Johnson in Kladderadatsch, March 28, 1926

Poland was not the only country lobbying for a permanent League of Nations Seat. So were Brazil and Spain, the former of which was adamantly opposed to admitting Germany, earning it an especially grotesque characterization from Artie Johnson in this cover cartoon.

"Vorverkauf an der Kaffe in Genf" by Oskar Garvens in Kladderadatsch, Berlin, March 28, 1926

Oskar Garvens added China (and "War") to the waiting list in his cartoon. 

Cartoonists must have had little upon which to draw Brazilian stereotypes, in case the fourth fellow in line appears Mexican to you. Mexico repeatedly refused invitations to join the League of Nations until 1931.

"She Will Have to Get a New Canary Now" by Arthur Racey in Montreal Star, March 19, 1926

The Brazilian government would be gravely disappointed that Germany was admitted to the League and Brazil was not granted a permanent seat. Brazil quit the League later that year.

In A.G. Racey's cartoon, "European Peace" holds an empty birdcage bereft of its former occupant, "the Locarno Concord Canary." The Locarno Concord had been hailed as a great success at its December 1, 1925 signing by the great powers of western Europe (see the Graphic History Tour post here). I think that by asking "Whose cat are you, anyway?", Racey was taking into account that Brazil was not a party to the Locarno Concord.

"Endresultat" by Werner Hahmann in Kladderadatsch, Berlin, March 28, 1926

Agreeing with Racey's pessimism, Hahmann's cartoon quotes from the final stanzas of "Des Sängers Fluch" (The Singer's Curse) by Ludwig Uhland, set to music by Robert Schumann.

In the poem, a pair of minstrels entertain a cruel king and his court, pleasing the queen but enraging the king, who kills the younger of the minstrels. The older minstrel levels a curse at the king which comes true: in the end, the king's once beautiful castle lies in ruins but for one lone, crumbling column, its king forgotten.

Everyone was not ready to write off the Locarno Treaties as a failure just yet, but they ultimately did prove inadequate to ensuring a lasting peace in Europe.

The treaties delineated Germany's western border, ceding Alsace-Lorraine to France, but did not settle disputed territories on Germany's eastern border with Poland. There were Polish enclaves on the west side of the Oder-Neisse line and Germans living on the east side of the rivers. Danzig/Gdansk was a further bone of contention: as part of Poland, it separated East Prussia from the rest of Germany; without it, Poland would be landlocked.

"Powerful Brazil" by Billy Ireland in Columbus Dispatch, March, 1926

But sure, you can just blame Brazil if you'd rather.

Or the bossa nova.

Christmas 1925

Welcome to our Graphical History Tour Christmas Special! We're just about through with the year 1925, when peace, goodwill, and sobriety reigned, and all was right with the world.

"Merry Christmas" by William Hanny in Philadelphia Inquirer, Dec. 25, 1925

I'm going to let Bill Hanny represent all the cartoonists who updated their Thanksgiving for General Prosperity cartoon for the next holiday on the calendar. The happy recipient of an overstuffed stocking here was Father Penn, the cartoon personification of the state of Pennsylvania, and not the guy on the Quaker Oats canister.

"Uncle Sam's Dream of Christmas" by Edward G. McCandlish in Washington Post, Dec. 25, 1925

McCandlish at the Washington Post expands on Hanny's theme, depicting a serving of Plenty, a Christmas tree festooned with Peace, Security, and No Foreign Entanglements; and, at lower right, an agreement between labor and management averting a coal miners' strike. That agreement hadn't actually materialized yet when this cartoon was drawn, however.

"The Very Thing He Wanted Most" by Clifford Berryman in Washington Evening Star, Dec. 25, 1925

Up the road at the Star, Clifford Berryman's Everyman had a more limited wish list. To his delight, Congress had passed the Coolidge administration's tax cut, to take effect in 1926.

"Good Will to Men" by Gustavo Bronstrup in San Francisco Chronicle, Dec. 24, 1925

Gustavo Brunstrup shared the San Francisco Chronicle's optimism that the U.S. Senate would overcome three years of obstruction by its "irreconcilables" and join Europe in agreeing to participate in the World Court.

"Christmas Bells" by Daniel Fitzpatrick in St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Dec. 24, 1925

Critics of the Coolidge administration such as Daniel Fitzpatrick might begrudge Republicans their peace and prosperity; they could still celebrate the Locarno agreements among the major European powers putting an end to war (offer not valid in Morocco, Syria, and Iraq), and the Geneva Protocol, drafted in June, banning chemical and biological weapons.

"The Face at the Window" by Ed LeCocq in Des Moines Register, Dec. 24, 1925

Ed LeCocq used the celebration of "the new spirit of mutual cooperation" and "comforts of capital and trade intercourse" in Europe to point out one country that was left out: Russia. 

"The Face at the Window" used to be a common cartoon theme in the Christmas season. In most such cartoons I've seen, that Face is a pitiable, sympathetic figure, left out of the warmth, feasting, and bonhomie inside, reminding readers of the plight of the poor. The cultural references that Google up for this forgotten cliché, however, are tales of criminals, murderers, and ghosts plotting their way in.

Perhaps that's why cartoonists stopped using "The Face at the Window" as a caption.

"Besorgnis" by Arthur Krüger in Kladderadatsch, Berlin, Dec. 13, 1925

A pair of German cartoons took skeptical views in varying degrees of Europe's newfound international comity. In Arthur Krüger's cartoon, Germany, France, Britain, Belgium, and Italy merrily dance around their Christmas tree, with its "Peace on Earth" topper, but Not-So-Jolly St. Nicholas worries that they are about to carelessly kick the whole thing over. In an age when candles, not LED lights, lit up the Christmas tree, knocking the tree over was liable to get it considerably too lit up.

"Der Untaugliche Nussknacker" by Werner Hahmann in Kladderadatsch, Berlin, Dec. 27, 1925

Werner Hahmann's Angel of Peace found the League of Nations (Völker Bund) not up to the task of cracking Disarmament (Abrüstung). 

These German cartoonists in the 1920's really were a bunch of sour pusses. It's as if they knew they were between the Wars.

"In the Hollow of His Hand" by Jesse Cargill for King Features Syndicate, ca. Dec. 24, 1925

Returning to America, I'm not sure what to make of Santa Claus holding the globe in the hollow of his hand. Does Jesse Cargill's Santa Claus look as annoyed to you as he does to me? He almost looks like he's getting ready to throw it at someone.

"Aw-w, There Ain't No Santa Claus" by Leslie Rogers in Chicago Defender, Dec. 26, 1925

There's no mistaking Leslie Rogers's intentions. Rogers's cartoon for the African-American newspaper the Chicago Defender ran alongside an editorial decrying the lynching in Clarksdale, Mississippi of Lindsey Coleman after a jury had acquitted him of murder charges. This while southern Senators were successfully filibustering the Dyer Anti-Lynching Bill for the third consecutive Congress.

"The Night Before Christmas" by Sam Hunter in Toronto Star, Dec. 24, 1925

Meanwhile, in Canada, the Progressive and Liberal Parties had both lost seats to the Conservatives in October elections, but not enough of them for the Conservatives to have a majority. Robert Forke's third-place Progressives had lost 36 of their previous 58 seats in Parliament, but held the balance of power between William Mackenzie King's Liberals, with whom they were more ideologically inclined, and Arthur Meighen's Conservatives.

"The Spirit of a White Christmas" by James Fitzmaurice in Vancouver Daily Province, Dec. 24, 1925

Shunting politics aside, James Fitzmaurice gets us back to some Christmas Spirit. The cartoon's "Mr. Citizen" had finished his shopping, subscribed to the newspaper's charitable fund (charity drives were a common newspaper practice at Christmastime), and apparently had a couple of libations he doesn't want to talk about. 

"Minus Whiskers and Reindeer" by Roy James in St. Louis Star, Dec. 24, 1925

Roy James noted that Santa was not the only one doing the heavy lifting for the holiday. 

"The Annual Daze" by Chester Gould in Chicago Evening American, ca. Dec. 25, 1925

The editorial cartoons of Chester Gould, later creator of "Dick Tracy," have appeared here before. This cartoon predates the pointy-chinned copper by about five years, and seems at first glance to be a light-hearted little gag about office employees not having their minds on their work between Christmas and New Year's.

Then one notices the little dingbat in the lower left corner. What Lincoln getting shot has to do with anything else in Gould's cartoon is completely beyond me.

So let us wrap up this week's Graphical Holiday Tour with a simple Christmas card with no weirdness, politics, faces at windows, or diareses

"Merry Christmas to Our Readers" by J.T. Alley in Commercial Appeal, Memphis Tenn., Dec. 25, 1925

And likewise to mine.