First, here is some historical context. After the bombshell revelation of the Zimmerman Telegram on March 1, 1917, in which “German Foreign Minister Arthur Zimmermann promise[d] the return of Texas, New Mexico and Arizona to Mexico as reward for siding with Germany if the U.S. enters the war,” Americans increasingly became pro-war. Then, the breaking point occurred. Exactly a month later, a German U-boat torpedoed an American cargo ship, the S.S. Aztec, in British waters. The next day, April 2, 1917, President Woodrow Wilson addressed a Joint Session of Congress, and called for action to make the world “safe for democracy” (we’ll come back to this phrase later). Wilson’s address likely inspired one of the earliest Abe Martin cartoons about America’s impending involvement in World War I. In the April 2, 1917 issue of the Indianapolis News, Hubbard’s Abe Martin quipped: “What’s become o’ the ole-fashioned patriotic citizen who used t’ say, ‘Well, I didn’t vote for him, but he’s my President jist th’ same’? Actions speak louder’n flags.” Hubbard, through Martin, is expressing an earnest, trusting patriotism that became a common theme for his cartoons during the war.
Congress declared war on Germany four days after Wilson’s address. For the next two and half years, Hubbard’s Abe Martin routinely commented on the war and its influence on the home front. As an example, Hubbard promoted an essential war-time product in his columns, the Liberty Bond. Liberty Bonds were the brainchild of William G. McAdoo, President Wilson’s Secretary of the Treasury, and facilitated a revenue stream for the federal government to finance the war. Within his cartoons, Hubbard encouraged purchasing Liberty Bonds and connected them to patriotism. In a cartoon from May 30, 1917, Hubbard opined that “Talkin’ big an’ flyin’ a flag from your radiator cap won’t keep an army goin’. Buy a Liberty loan bond!” The very next day, the News ran an advertisement for Liberty Bonds, available for purchase from the Fletcher American National Bank, with Hubbard’s passionate call the day before. A year later, another mention of Liberty Bonds emerges in Hubbard’s column. “One o’ th’ best returns from a Liberty bond is an eased conscience,” declared the humorist through his down home alter-ego, Abe Martin.
Hubbard also criticized what he saw as empty forms of patriotism through his Abe Martin cartoons. “Patriotism,” wrote the cartoonist, “that don’t git below th’ neckband, don’t help much t’ win th’ war.” Patriotism in wartime, in Hubbard’s eyes, also manifested itself through sacrifice. “It begins t’ look like we’d all have t’ wait till [former Secretary of State William Jennings] Bryan is President before git our hair cut,” Hubbard penned. Bryan left his post at the State department in 1915 over objections with Wilson’s pro-British support in the Lusitania’s sinking. Conversely, Wilson’s response also led to growing antagonism toward Germany. Hubbard is implicitly saying that until a peace-candidate like Bryan won the presidency and the war came to a close, consumer luxuries like haircuts must be jettisoned. In another cartoon from May 2, 1917, Hubbard wrote that, “It begins t’ look like even th’ feller that kin whittle out a wooden chain will be made t’ feel th’ war.”
While liberty loans, patriotism, and sacrifice exemplified the home font, other developments were not as positive. During the war, a growing cadre of teachers, legislators, and citizens advocated against the teaching of German in Indianapolis public school system. This movement sought to undermine the culture of the state’s substantial German-American community. Many Hoosiers viewed German-Americans as disloyal, unpatriotic, or anti-American because of their ancestry, and their continued use of the German language. On May 3, 1918, Hubbard wryly commented on the situation via Abe Martin: “Now that they’ve taken German out o’ th’ schools let’s take Latin out of the seed catalogs,” mocking the taxonomic descriptions of plants. Despite his strong support for America during the war, Hubbard’s subtle critique of removing German language instruction from the schools showed his commitment to cultural diversity and his rejection the crass chauvinism of its opponents. For the benefit of . By 1919, despite Hubbard and others’ criticism, Indiana legislators (led by future Governor Warren McCray) crafted and passed legislation that eliminated the teaching of German in all Indiana schools. As a result, German language instruction, with a few exceptions, disappeared from Indiana’s schools.
Hubbard’s cartoons received national recognition from former Indiana governor, vice president, and jokester in his own right, Thomas Marshall. The News reported on December 19, 1917 that Marshall wrote to Hubbard and noted his precarious position as Vice President:
Dear Kin Hubbard—Not the least among your many admirable qualities is your memory of the needs of a Vice president [sic] to be cheered upon his lonely way. He is supposed not to talk, but the right chuckle is guaranteed to him. As a chucker in the laughter rib you never miss.
Despite Marshall’s kind words, Hubbard nonetheless continued his appraisals of American involvement in the war with Abe Martin as his proxy. In an April 12 1918 cartoon, Hubbard wrote that “if the United States would jest wake up an’ take t’ th’ war like it t’ belted overcoats an’ high shoes we’d git on faster.” Another column from May 28, 1918 encouraged leaders to “wait till we win th’ war an’ we’ll all have a banquet.” That doesn’t mean he was unwilling to rhetorically rough up the enemy. A May 2, 1918 piece noted how “th’ only time th’ kaiser’s [sic] six sons ever git in th’ front line is when somebuddy comes along with a camera.”
In the fall of 1918, Hubbard’s Abe Martin Publishing Company released a compendium of Abe Martin cartoons and musings under the title, On the War and Other Musings. Multiple ads for the book ran in the News, particularly during the holiday season. “Hundreds of Abe Martin’s inimitable paragraph’s touching on everything under the sun from sassafras to world peace,” read an ad from December 2, 1918. It was also fairly easy to purchase to book. For the low price of $1.06 ($15.71 in today’s dollars), readers could have their copy shipped to them as long as they were within 200 miles of Indianapolis. It’d be “return to sender” if the postage was farther.
Kin Hubbard’s “Abe Martin” earned him the respect of his readers, political leaders, and the broader general public. His cartoons during World War I showed a commitment to his community, his country, and his craft. Hubbard, through Abe Martin, gave readers a Midwestern, “crackerbarrel” embodiment of the home front: rustic, altruistic, and patriotic. While certainly idealized, Hubbard’s art represented a commonplace, earnest notion of America during the war.
On Valentine’s Day, we thought it would be a great time to share a different side of Indiana culture during the tumultuous years of World War I, in the form of valentine cartoons. John T. McCutcheon was one of Indiana’s most celebrated cartoonists from the era, and his “wartime valentines” help us understand how the home front viewed this integral time in world history.
John T. McCutcheon was a Pulitzer-Prize winning cartoonist for the Chicago Tribune, where he worked for 43 years. Born in South Raub, Tippecanoe County, Indiana on May 6, 1870, McCutcheon grew up “in the rural areas surrounding Lafayette.” He attended Purdue University where he was “a founding member of the University’s first fraternity, Sigma Chi” and the “co-editor of the University’s first yearbook, the Debris.” After graduating college in 1889, he worked as a cartoonist for the Chicago Morning News andRecord-Herald until he moved to the Tribune in 1903. His artistic style mirrored his experiences growing up the Midwest; he developed a character called “A Boy in Springtime” who would appear in front-page pieces having small-town fun with friends and his dog (the dog first appeared in a William McKinley presidential campaign cartoon, and became much beloved by readers). As R. C. Harvey of the Comics Journal noted, McCutcheon’s cartoons were “the first to throw the slow ball in cartooning, to draw the human interest picture that was not produced to change votes or to amend morals but solely to amuse or to sympathize.”
Paralleling his more personable cartoons, McCutcheon partnered with another Hoosier author, George Ade, to create a series of valentines for charity during World War I. The idea originated from the Indianapolis Branch of the American Fund for French Wounded and its contributors were a who’s who of Indiana arts, including Ade and McCutcheon as well as Meredith Nicholson, Kin Hubbard, and William Herschell. As reported in the South Bend News-Times on January 28, 1918, “Prominent Indiana artists and authors this year have been making comic valentines . . . and are guaranteed by those who have seen them to send grins and cheer to soldiers at home and abroad.” The article also outlined the American Fund for French Wounded, noting that “the proceeds will go for furthering the work in France among wounded soldiers and destitute families, which is the committee looking after the funds is carrying on.” Ads even ran in the Indianapolis News to promote the Valentines, published by Charles Mayer & Company, once they were available.
The first valentine in the digital collection, entitled “From Her Mother”, shows a concerned mother writing to a “Mr. Soldier Man” while a variant of McCutcheon’s iconic dog looks on in the background. The photos on and above the desk in the cartoon are important to context, as the photos of the mother’s daughter and her soldier beau face each other longingly, while a portrait of the mother sternly oversees over both of the photos. In the cartoon, the mother’s letter reads:
Mr. Soldier Man.
Dear Sir:
I can not send what my daughter wrote,
It might set fire to the darned old boat.
Yours truly,
– The Night Watch.
The mother’s face shows a concern not only for her daughter’s overly passionate words. McCutcheon’s style of strong lines and warm, humane features also comes through in this valentine.
George Ade and John T. McCutcheon, “Her Choice This Year.” IMCPL/Digital Indy.
Another great valentine in the collection entitled, “Her Choice This Year”, ties the romantic love normally associated with Valentine’s Day with love of country. Ade’s poem reads:
Columbia wants you to know,
That you’re her particular beau.
She’s likewise “particular.” So
That’s why you’ve been picked as her beau.
The young woman, aptly named Columbia, holds the hand of her uniformed soldier as he looks at her lovingly. She’s also dressed in a shirt and skirt of the red, white, and blue with a pair of roman sandals. And of course, McCutcheon’s iconic dog looks up at them in the foreground. This valentine exhibits the strong patriotic fervor during the period, but in a charming, homespun way.
George Ade and John T. McCutcheon, “Some One Has Not Forgotten.” IMCPL/Digital Indy.
The next valentine captures a woman’s longing for her partner who is off at war. Named “Some One Has Not Forgotten,” it depicts a young woman knitting in a chair while thinking of her partner trekking across Europe in a snowstorm. Here’s Ade’s text with the valentine:
My heart to-day
Is far away
Across the rolling brine.
So while I sit
And knit and knit
You’re still my valentine.
This depiction of men and women evokes a more traditional assumption of gender during the period than say “Columbia” and her beau above. The woman’s thoughts of her partner, floating above her head and colorless, attempt to convey the arduous and grim task of war. In contrast, McCutcheon’s drawing of the young woman is clear and with beautiful coloring. Ade and McCutcheon’s valentine cleverly renders the feelings of many young women while their partners were at war.
The final valentine in the digital collection is called, “To You Somewhere,” and it depicts one of Valentine’s Day’s most enduring symbols, Cupid. In this version, a nude Cupid braves the cold weather to deliver a valentine to a soldier in the snow. The message reads:
I don’t know just where you are to-day,
I don’t know how many miles away;
Whether you’re out where the bullets fly,
Or safe and sounds at the good old “Y.” [Y.M.C.A]
I have no message from o’er the sea
To let me know that you think of me,
But I’ll make an oath and my name I’ll sign,
That you are my only Valentine.
The soldier’s delight at receiving the message from a saluting cupid is evident. He even has his gun down and his hands up, perhaps in surprise that the symbol of love is in a war zone, or perhaps the soldier is in the act of accepting the valentine from Cupid. Of the four digitized valentines, this is the only one without a female main subject, despite the text being from the soldier’s love. It shows the perspective of the soldier receiving a valentine, rather than a woman creating or imagining one.
The period between the 1890’s and the 1920’s is known in the art world as the Golden Age of American Illustration. A surprising number of people from Hamilton County, Indiana, were contributors to this movement. Until recently, it wasn’t realized how interconnected they were. However, research has now uncovered material showing the extent of their influence on each other.
George Brehm at easel, courtesy of Hamilton East Public Library Collection.
The notion of a common group was first brought up in the Noblesville High School annual in 1904 when they noticed how many alumni were going on to artistic careers. The group got a name from a February 2, 1913, article in the Indianapolis Star which reported on a book that one member had illustrated and used the phrase “Noblesville School Forges to the Front Again.” (This is actually a misnomer – some of the artists were from towns like Carmel. Noblesville was just the largest community in the area.)
The patriarch of the group was Granville Bishop (1831-1902). Bishop was born in Fayette County and his family moved to Hamilton County in 1836. He was a self-taught artist who taught penmanship, painted wagons, and did advertising signs on buildings to supplement his income from painting. He did well enough to support a wife and five children despite being physically handicapped. Unfortunately, few examples of his work exist today. There are two paintings at the Indiana State Museum and a painting of the Indian chief Red Cloud somewhere in the Indianapolis area. According to an interview with George Brehm in the May 1943 issue of the Rainbow, the national magazine for the Delta Tau Delta fraternity, Bishop and an unknown woman watercolorist were credited as the inspirations for some of the next generation of Hamilton County illustrators.
James Whitcomb Riley, illustrated by George Brehm, Bookman magazine (December 1903): 349, accessed Hathitrust.org.
George Brehm (1878-1966) and James Ellsworth “Worth” Brehm (1883-1928) were key members of the group. After graduating from Noblesville High School in 1898 and 1902 respectively, they went to Indiana University and other schools for training in art. George achieved his first local fame by doing caricatures of Hoosier authors. After working at the Indianapolis Star, they moved to New York around 1905 and were soon very successful. George had his first Saturday Evening Post cover in 1906 and Worth had his first cover in 1908. They established separate careers in 1912 when Worth moved to an artist colony in Connecticut. George and his family had an apartment in New York and a summer home on Martha’s Vineyard. Much of the brothers’ work was based on scenes from their boyhood in Noblesville.
James Ellsworth Brehm, “The Song of the Cardinal,” Retail Catalog of Standard and Holiday Books (1913-1914): 76, accessed Google Books.
Franklin Booth (1874-1948) and Hanson Booth (1884-1944) were raised in Carmel and followed much the same path as the Brehms. Hanson went to Noblesville High School and was a classmate of Worth Brehm. Franklin Booth would return to Carmel from New York on regular occasions and eventually built a studio behind his family’s home. He is the only one of the four artists who is buried in Hamilton County. He developed a very unique style based on hundreds of pen strokes that would make the finished drawing look like an engraving. Three books have been written about Franklin and his style which, among other things, has become an important influence on modern comic book artists.
Hanson Booth, Boys’ Life (November 1914), accessed Google Books.
These four artists did illustrations for books, advertisements, and stories in magazines such as Ladies Home Journal, American Magazine, Colliers, and Cosmopolitan. For a short time, they ran an art school together. Their work could also be found in the business magazines of the period. At one point or another, all of them worked with James Whitcomb Riley. George Brehm did work as varied as Saturday Evening Post covers, women’s magazines, Business Week, and Edgar Rice Burroughs stories. Worth Brehm was known for his illustrations of children, and became famous for his images of Penrod, Tom Sawyer, Huckleberry Finn, and others. Franklin Booth did pipe organ advertisements and worked with authors like Theodore Dreiser and Joyce Kilmer. Hanson did not become as well-known as his brother, but did work for pulp adventure magazines, Popular Science, and Boys’ Life.
Thomas Blaine Stanley (1884-1965), a classmate of Worth Brehm and Hanson Booth at Noblesville High School, became known for a different kind of drawing. He began as an illustrator, but eventually got a degree in English. He used his degree to teach courses in business English, which eventually developed into the modern profession of Marketing. He wrote two standard textbooks on the subject, which would have been used by the sort of people who populated the fictional HBO series “Mad Men.” Along with this, he used his art skills to become a cartoonist, creating a regular business-oriented comic strip in the magazine Advertising and Selling. It could be considered a “Dilbert” for the 1920’s.
Thomas Stanley, Advertising and Selling (June 26, 1920), accessed Google Books.
Franklin Booth had protégés – Ralph Applegate (1904-1978) and Booth’s nephew Grant Christian (1911-1989). Applegate was known for creating murals at the 1933 Century of Progress Exposition in Chicago. Christian was a part of the WPA post office mural project and did murals in Indianapolis and Nappanee.
There were also acquaintances of the group who were recognized locally for their art talent, but went into other careers. Worthington Hagerman (1878-1967) worked for the State Department and was Consul in Lisbon, Portugal, during WWII. Buren Mitchell (1886-1955) became a respected college theater teacher in Oregon.
Russell Berg, accessed Stanton Renner Collection.
There were other area illustrators, but it’s not known how much they interacted with the group. Russell Berg (1901-1966), did illustration and editorial cartoons, and became known for his Chautauqua performances involving drawing and lecturing. Floyd Hopper (1909-1984) was known regionally for his watercolors, and known locally for his illustration and mural work.
While Hamilton County is not typically thought of as having an artistic heritage, obviously there was inspiration here. The tradition is evident in the ever-developing Carmel Arts and Design District, which features various galleries, showrooms, and the Hoosier Salon. Continuing to research and discuss artists of the past will highlight Indiana’s artistic heritage and, hopefully, encourage others to follow.
