Laughing at the Expense of Labor and Capital
Puck was an early American humor magazine founded by Austrian-born cartoonist Joseph Keppler. It began its life as a short-lived German-language weekly in St. Louis in 1871. After Keppler moved to New York City, he resurrected the magazine with fellow émigré Adolph Schwartzmann in 1876. They followed up their initial success with an English edition the year after.
For the next four decades, the magazine produced cartoons and satire that caricatured a wide cast of politicians and industrialists, and skewered all types of isms. Issues typically contained 32 pages, with full-color front and back covers, as well as a double-page color centerfold, that featured prominent cartoonists like Louis Dalrymple and J.S. Pughe.
Bought by the William Randolph Hearst company in 1916, the magazine lasted just two more years. But it left behind a rich trove of cultural commentary, in which we see the warring ideas of the Gilded Age played out for laughs. Here is a collection that focuses on one of the era’s most fraught divides: capital vs. labor.
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Capitalists and socialists have traded places. Police break up a demonstration by capitalists, while socialist bullies scold a priest for delivering sermons that are "dee-cidely capitalistic." A capitalist rally takes place in a "Fifth Avenue Dive," while a dismayed, newspaper-reading socialist learns that “son of socialist leader joins capitalistic ranks.” Meanwhile, the "Election Returns Bulletin" doesn’t look good for the capitalists.
Credit: Harry Grant Dart, Puck, July 1909/Courtesy of the Library of Congress -
A Lilliputian Uncle Sam rows a boat with the help of an outsized J.P. Morgan.
Credit: Udo J. Keppler, Puck, April 1911/Courtesy of the Library of Congress -
John R. Tanner, governor of Illinois from 1880-1883 gained national attention for his neutral stance in labor disputes. When violence broke out in the Illinois coalfields, he sent state troops to quell it, but prohibited either side form bringing in armed men. Here he’s depicted as a diabolical executioner with a noose "For Capitalists."
Credit: Louis Dalrymple, Puck, November 1898/Courtesy of the Library of Congress -
The capitalist machine at work! J.P. Morgan uses a can labeled "Legislation” to oil a machine labeled "Wall St," attached to a "Deposits Steam Pipe." Through a complex series of wheels and levers, Morgan’s contraption is attached to a "'Public Service' Machine" that operates with a belt labeled "Control of 'Other Peoples Money’” — all of which turns a device with shoe-shaped spokes that kick the "American Citizen" in the rear as he shovels coal labeled "Savings" into a boiler labeled "Syndicate Bank Boiler Co."
Credit: Albert Levering, Puck, February 1911/Courtesy of the Library of Congress -
From his prime American perch, J.P. Morgan holds a large dollar-shaped magnet that pulls in the world’s precious artifacts.
Credit: Udo J. Keppler, Puck, June 1911/Courtesy of the Library of Congress -
A "Riotous Striker" knocks down the pillars of Order, Law, Capital, Labor, Enlightenment, and Progress. The caption warns that this “modern Samson” is “always the first victim of his own violence.”
Credit: Udo J. Keppler, Puck, July 1901/Courtesy of the Library of Congress -
A man labeled "Labor" sits on a firecracker labeled "Capital," with a fuse labeled “Wages” that he ignites with a torch labeled "Strikes” that emits fumes of “Discontent.” According to the caption, this is “labor’s idea of elevating itself.”
Credit: J. S. Pughe, Puck, July 1902/Courtesy of the Library of Congress
