Argosy Book Store of New York City has acquired a 1959 New Yorker rough by Charles Addams. It is hard to imagine another single panel cartoonist whose preliminary work would be priced at $4,000. To the shop's credit, the issue of the magazine in which the finished cartoon appears is fully cited.
 Mrs. Gilson's Day Nursery SchoolCharles Addams Preliminary art The New Yorker, November 21, 1959, p. 42 |
The full sheet has some paper losses at the lower left and top center.
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Mrs. Gilson's Day Nursery School
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| Charles Addams's corrections to the man observing the school are evident above his signature |
The subject matter, it's safe to say, is one that would not be mined by the magazine today for humor. Addams gets away with it by only implying the presence of children, and by portraying Mrs. Gilson as matronly. The machine gun is a disciplinary prop; the school is a prison.
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| Detail of the man observing Mrs. Gilson at work |
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| Verso |
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| Charles Addams Argosy Book Store listing retrieved October 20, 2022 |
For the finished composition, Addams has made the observer more prominent, enlarging his figure and widening the sidewalk.
Mrs. Gilson's Day Nursery School
Charles Addams
The New Yorker, November 21, 1959, p. 42
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Mrs. Gilson's Day Nursery School
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| Cartoons by Charles Addams and Gardner Rea |
Addams's finished drawing with its masterful shading contrasts nicely on the magazine's page spread with the line work of cartoonist Gardner Rea. Rea's Thanksgiving turkeys are here referring to that year's crop of cranberries contaminated with pesticides. That historical episode has been largely forgotten.
The Great Cranberry Scare of 1959
February 4, 2023 Update: The Addams rough is no longer available (sold today, I believe).
Note: Today, of course, a gun gag set in a nursery school would be unthinkable. School mass shootings were not an issue in Addams's time. In recent years, the reality of schools and guns is handled very soberly in the magazine, often on the covers and, of course, in the editorial content. See, for example, the recent Cover Story: "Chris Ware's 'Lockdown.'"
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