Nast, Thomas: Politics as usual

This is probably my favorite political image: Harper’s Weekly cartoonist Thomas Nast’s take on New York’s William “Boss” Tweed – with money head. Tweed was played by Jim Broadbent in the movie.

Thomas Nast (1840-1902) holds the title of ‘father of the American cartoon’ and along the way ended up turning both donkey and elephant into American political icons.

Prior to Nast’s involvement, ‘It all started with an insult. During Andrew Jackson’s 1828 presidential campaign, his political opponents labeled him a ‘jackass.’ Stubborn as he was, Jackson co-opted the insult and began putting a donkey on his election posters.’

In 1870, Nast used Jackson’s donkey to represent the whole Democratic Party in a political cartoon (above) – followed up in 1874 with an elephant for the Grand Old Party (below)

Nast also developed Uncle Sam and Santa Claus – as well as the prototype character used for the Statue of Liberty.

For more on Nast, go here.

The political animals have been fighting it out ever since.


Photo by and © John Lund

Sources: World’s Strangest, CBR and John Lund

5 Responses to “Nast, Thomas: Politics as usual”

  1. My best friend is the great-granddaughter of Thomas Nast. I dated her brother, Thomas Nast St.Hill. Just a bit of trivia. I love his work.

  2. Whoa. Cool!

  3. Garmin Nuvi 1490t GPS…

    […]just below, are some totally unrelated sites to ours, however, they are definitely worth checking out[…]…

  4. good article…

    Hello there, just became alert to your blog through Google, and found that it’s truly informative. I am gonna watch out for brussels. I will be grateful if you continue this in future. A lot of people will be benefited from your writing. Cheers!…

  5. You should check this out…

    […] Wonderful story, reckoned we could combine a few unrelated data, nevertheless really worth taking a look, whoa did one learn about Mid East has got more problerms as well […]……


Creative Commons License

the work at the mehallo blog. beta. is licensed under a creative commons attribution - noncommercial - no derivative works 3.0 united states license.  if reposting, credit must be given to steve mehallo - and if possible, please provide a link back to the mehallo blog. beta.

i include images for the purpose of critique, review, promotion and inspiration - and always make my best effort give credit/link back to the original source.  if i’ve screwed up, please fire me a note.

page layout based on the wordpress 'darkwater theme' by antbag, adapted and redesigned by mehallo.  valuable php assistance from bill mead.