Gilded Age Cartoons

Gilded Age Political Cartoon Questions

• What is the event or issue that inspired the cartoon?

• Are there any real people or places in the cartoon? If not, what images are portrayed in the cartoon?

• Identify the specific artistic techniques used the cartoon (i.e. symbolism, analogy, exaggeration, labeling, and irony). What is the artist trying to show the reader by using these techniques?

• What is the cartoonist’s point of view about the topic portrayed in the cartoon? Give examples to support your interpretation.

• Is this cartoon persuasive? Explain why or why not.

• What other techniques could the artist have used to make this cartoon more persuasive?

Harper’s Weekly, November 11, 1871 “The Tammany Tiger Loose! What are you going to do about it?”

Bernard Gillam, 1883. “A warning to Grover Cleveland in 1883 that the Tammany organization support had proved fatal to three Democratic candidates already.” This illustration for Puck magazine shows Democratic hopeful Grover Cleveland as worse for wear after a struggle with Thomas Nast’s Tammany tiger.

Weakened by defeats, the tiger is hunted by enemies in 1893. Puck cartoon by F. Opper