In 2016, when I first wrote of some twelve of Peter Arno's prints created for the New York Post, I had little idea what the cryptic images sent out to readers as a part of a promotion were all about. Certainly, as stand-alone cartoons, they were not of the quality of his New Yorker work by a long shot. But what exactly were they?
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| https://www.abebooks.co.uk/servlet/BookDetailsPL?bi=5970406030&searchurl=tn%3Dcartoons%26sortby%3D17%26an%3Darno%2520peter |
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Later I came across the original advertisements for a contest in the South Bend Tribune (Indiana). It became clear that these cartoons were not meant as ordinary gag cartoons but, rather, as rebuses which hinted at "Famous Names." Thus the first cartoon above hides the name of actress Marion Davies and the second unravels as Anita Loos who wrote, among other things, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. As for the third cartoon, the one with the bathtub, well, I have no idea. To solve the cartoon, you really needed to be offered multiple choices. For example, when the New York Post's contest was announced in late 1935 in the pages of The New Yorker, there were four names to choose from in the example. Thus it was relatively simple to solve. Here, try your hand:
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| Peter Arno The New Yorker, September 28, 1935, p. 33 |
To further complicate matters, the contest was nationally syndicated and appeared in newspapers all over the country. The prints seem to have been offered in series of twelve, sometimes with the sponsoring newspaper's logo at the bottom of each and sometimes not. Contests may have appeared across the country on different days and in different orders. And even the contest itself had variable titles. It wasn't always "Famous Names." I'm not sure the New York Post had a name for it at all.
I originally found a dozen prints from the Post and now Joel Jacobus has found a different dozen from the Seattle Star. Joel's expertise lies in the area of Charles Addams memorabilia, but he's not afraid to go off topic when duty calls. I apologize for stealing some of Joel's thunder with my introductory words. He starts at the beginning with his own introduction and writes:
During the height of the Great Depression, Americans went crazy for a newspaper contest that was syndicated to newspapers all over the country. Why should Attempted Bloggery care? Because this contest used cartoons. But not just any cartoons. They used cartoons from one of the greatest New Yorker cartoonists, Peter Arno.
Today, because we are sadder and wiser people, we might consider “The Great Names Contest” a bit of a scam.
Or maybe it provided good value for the money. It’s hard to really grasp how much ten cents was worth in 1936. The internet says that in 1936 ten cents could buy you a loaf of bread. And when 96 million people are out of work, a loaf of bread is a big deal.
The Great Names Contest happened in newspapers all over the country over the course of at least two years (and possibly more), but this partial description from The Atlanta Constitution newspaper gives you an idea of what it was:
“Beginning Sunday, June 14, 1936, and continuing each day for 12 weeks, The Atlanta Constitution will publish a cartoon. Each cartoon will in some way suggest or represent a name. The name may be that of a person, city, state, nation, book, song or motion picture. The Atlanta Constitution will award a First Prize of $4,000 as part of $6,000 in prizes to the person or persons submitting the best or most appropriate name to each of the 84 cartoons and in all other ways conforming to these official rules.”
What this description doesn’t say is that each applicant had to send in a dime every time that they submitted a Great Name for a cartoon. And you had to send in names for ALL 84 of the cartoons to be considered for the prizes. So an 84 cartoon contest cost the contestant $8.40. Which is the equivalent of 84 loaves of bread in the middle of the Great Depression. But, win or lose, each contestant received a “Master Copy” of each cartoon for which they had sent in a name. A “master copy,” based on what the Seattle Star sent out, was a very low quality print, on very thin 9 5/8” x 8 3/8” paper. When compared to the $0.15 cost of a 1936 New Yorker magazine which would provide you with many much higher quality cartoon prints, it doesn’t seem like such a good deal.
The Sunday Star of Washington DC reported on August 29, 1937, in an article titled “Contest Craze On,” that “in the past year or two, with the advent of the 'Great Names' type of contest with their big prizes and fascinating picture puzzles, everybody and his neighbor began contesting.”
The Radio Dial weekly newspaper had a “contest column” with a “contest reporter” and in the June 17th 1937 edition the reporter writes about how to win “great names” contests, although he mostly refers to them as “picture title contests.”
A partial list of newspapers that held Great Names Contests includes:
1935
The New York Post
1936
The Charleston Gazette, The Atlanta Constitution, The Los Angeles Times, The Seattle Star, The Bristol Courier, and The Oakland Tribune
1937
The Portland News Telegram, and The Worcester Massachusetts Evening Gazette
Below is an envelope from The Seattle Star with sixteen Peter Arno cartoons that was sent to a contestant of the Great Names contest in 1936.
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| Miami |
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| Jack Sharkey (boxer) |
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| Kalamazoo |
Notes:
Worcester Massachusetts Evening Gazette’s Great Names Contest – winners reported in the 01/29/38 issue of Radio Guide.
Oakland Tribune (California) announces a Great Names Game in at least their 06/27/36, 07/01/36, 07/02/36, & 07/03/36 issues. In the instructions written in their ads regarding submitting entries to the contest it reads in part, “Ten cents in coin must accompany each weekly series. In return for this remittance you will receive a master print of the week’s featured cartoon picture at the conclusion of the contest.”
Portland News Telegram has a billboard for a Great Names subscription contest 1937:
06/17/37 issue of Radio Dial, in their column, “Contest Club,” reports on an article in the June 1937 “Contest Magazine” titled “How To Win In The Great Names Contest” by Elsie Stuart.
03/31/36 issue of Charleston Gazette from Charleston West Virginia has an ad for their new Great Names Contest that begins, “Wealth Beckons You! Win Your Share of $5,000.00 in prizes offered in The Gazette’s New GREAT NAMES CONTEST”
07/13/36 The Atlanta Constitution newspaper explains the rules for the Great Names contest which reads in part, “Beginning Sunday, June 14, 1936, and continuing each day for 12 weeks, The Atlanta Constitution will publish a cartoon. Each cartoon will in some way suggest or represent a name. The name may be that of a person, city, state, nation, book, song or motion picture. The Atlanta Constitution will award a First Prize of $4,000 as part of $6,000 in prizes to the person or persons submitting the best or most appropriate name to each of the 84 cartoons and in all other ways conforming to these official rules.” For at least the first 28 cartoons of the contest the newspaper showed the cartoon and a list of four to seven names for the reader to choose from as the contest progressed the list of possible names got longer and longer.
09/09/36 Los Angeles Times publishes the rules for it’s Great Names Contest.
The Sunday Star of Washington, DC reported on August 29, 1937, in an article titled “Contest Craze On” that “in the past year or two, with the advent of the “Great Names” type of contest with their big prizes and fascinating picture puzzles, everybody and his neighbor began contesting.”
The Radio Dial weekly newspaper has a “contest column” with a “contest reporter” and in the June 17th 1937 edition writes about how to win “great names” contests, although he mostly refers to them as “picture title contests.”
Note: Whew! My thanks to Joel Jacobus for providing us with all this research on a syndicated newspaper contest from nearly ninety years ago. He has outdone himself once again in this contribution to Attempted Bloggery.
In order to come to a total eighty-four images, there must be seven sets of twelve cartoons. This blog has posted two sets of prints; there should be another five sets. Readers who can fill in the gaps here may help me do so. Also, I could use a little help solving some of these tricky rebuses.
Where are the "Great Names" originals by Peter Arno? I don't recall seeing these. Has anyone?
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