Rube Goldberg's Pipe

If you hang around New York enough, you'll find traces of the great cartoonists of yesteryear all over. Last night, after dinner on West 36th Street at Keens Steakhouse—the apostrophe has been abandoned to history—we admired a display that was a small part of the world's largest collection of churchwarden pipes. The chop house's past patrons included more than 90,000 members of the Pipe Club, whose pipes were registered and stored on the premises by a pipe warden, and dutifully retrieved when the customer returned by pipe boys. Many twentieth century luminaries were members of this club: Theodore Roosevelt, Herbert Hoover, Albert Einstein, Enrico Caruso, Will Rogers, Babe Ruth, Robert Benchley—and cartoonist Rube Goldberg. I've given his pipe it's own photograph:

Which is not to say that Goldberg's pipe doesn't share the display case with the pipes of some mighty fine people.

There are some more recent members of the Pipe Club as well. Some of the names may be familiar.

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Driving in South Dakota: Frank Modell and Don Martin

Frank Modell's cartoon for The New Yorker of November 25, 1950 was a good one, strong enough to be included a quarter century later in The New Yorker Album of Drawings 1925-1975. It can therefore be said to have been somewhat on the radar in the mid-to-late 1970s.

Frank Modell
The New Yorker, November 25, 1950, page 45

Modell may have concluded that Teddy Roosevelt was the funniest President on Mount Rushmore. His decision to mess with TR's facial expression is an interesting one, having the great sculpted head grimacing in reaction to his decapitation and displacement. Compare that with the couple in the car, who appear too stunned even to react.

Don Martin, whether he knew of Modell's cartoon or not, conceived a similar gag for Mad #196 dated January 1978. His challenge with Late One Afternoon in South Dakota is to decide what sort of multi-panel setup will deliver the best payoff. He decides, of all things, on some madcap signage play. 

Don Martin
Original art
Mad #196, January 1978, page 25

So, we are asked to believe that on a mountainside road with no guard rail—at least Modell does give us a guardrail—a highway department vehicle comes screeching to a halt before a convertible that is possibly already braked. The highway worker does not close the road in response to a critically unsafe condition, but instead changes the sign to read something utterly preposterous that we don't really understand until the final panel. This is a Don Martin cartoon, so in reality we probably won't question any of this nonsense. Note how Martin has the driver—and the driver's hat—do the reacting, not the stately Lincoln head. The original art went unsold at Swann Galleries earlier this month for reasons that probably have nothing to do with the missing guard rail.

Don Martin
Full page original art
Mad #196, January 1978, page 25

Don Martin
Swann Galleries Sale 2608, Lot 191, June 9, 2022

https://catalogue.swanngalleries.com/Lots/auction-lot/DON-MARTIN-(1931-2000)-One-Late-Afternoon-in-South-Dakota-MA?saleno=2608&lotNo=191&refNo=794740

I'm certainly not going to declare a winner here, although very likely you can infer my own preference. My guess is that fans of The New Yorker will prefer Modell's cartoon, and that fans of Mad will prefer Martin's, and all's right on Mount Rushmore.

Spot drawing by Thomas Eastwood and cartoon by Frank Modell

https://archives.newyorker.com/newyorker/1950-11-25/flipbook/044/

Art by Dave—Ahem! David—Berg and Don Martin with marginalia by Sergio Aragonés

https://archive.org/details/mad_magazine_196_jan_1978/page/n25/mode/2up

Thomas Eastwood

Note:  Who then is the funnier president, Abe Lincoln or Teddy Roosevelt? 

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Drew Friedman: All the Presidents

A new volume of portraits by illustrator and caricaturist Drew Friedman has just been released. As the book cover indicates, All the Presidents contains thoughtful, telling portraits of each of America's forty-four presidents. (NB: There are forty-five presidencies because Grover Cleveland served as the 22nd and 24th president.)

Drew Friedman
All the Presidents (2019)

http://www.fantagraphics.com/all-the-presidents/

The book's publication is being celebrated tonight in Strand Bookstore's Rare Book Room.  (The entrance is on Broadway at 12th Street.) Mr. Friedman will be there in conversation with comedian Robert Klein. The ticket price includes a copy of the book, and there will be a signing immediately following the conversation.

The book goes by the numbers, beginning with George Washington. It's strange to see a president with no party affiliation. How long do you suppose that would last? The two-party system, remember, is not a part of our written Constitution.

Drew Friedman
1:  George Washington

http://www.fantagraphics.com/all-the-presidents/

It has been extraordinarily rewarding to watch Drew Friedman develop his technique and extend his expressive range in recent years. This new book contains some of his most perceptive character studies, certainly among the best he has ever done. They reveal new insights with repeated viewings.

Drew Friedman
26:  Theodore Roosevelt

http://www.fantagraphics.com/all-the-presidents/

Just to quibble, a word or two might be in order here regarding party designation. Republicans, of course, are members of the Republican Party—no confusion there. Democrats, on the other hand, are members of the Democratic Party, not the "Democrat Party." "Democrat Party," in fact, is meant as a slur and it has been spoken so frequently by Republicans in recent decades that we hardly notice it anymore. So, while Barack Obama is indeed a proud Democrat, his party's proper name is still the Democratic Party.

Drew Friedman
44:  Barack Obama

http://www.fantagraphics.com/all-the-presidents/

The following extraordinary presidential portraits are new to the internet. These higher-resolution images have been graciously provided to Attempted Bloggery by the artist:

Drew Friedman
6:  John Quincy Adams

Image courtesy of the artist

Drew Friedman
16:  Abraham Lincoln

Image courtesy of the artist

Drew Friedman
34:  Dwight Eisenhower

Image courtesy of the artist

Drew Friedman
44:  Barack Obama

Image courtesy of the artist

Drew Friedman's artistic process begins with a detailed preliminary pencil study:

Drew Friedman
Preliminary art
45:  Donald Trump

Image courtesy of the artist

After this he develops the finished portrait: 

Drew Friedman
45:  Donald Trump

Image courtesy of the artist

While Drew Friedman's New Yorker cover makes no secret of his interest in presidential portraiture, it uses a more fanciful approach than we see in the contents of this book.

Drew Friedman
The New Yorker, January 26, 2009

But wait, there's more! All the original artwork from All the Presidents will be exhibited at the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum at OSU along with over one-hundred of the artist's various presidential images from over the years, including the original Barack Obama inauguration New Yorker cover, above, and presidential ephemera from the artist's personal collection. The show opens on November 2 and will run through February 9, 2020. The official opening reception will be on Saturday the 16th of November when the artist will be giving a talk moderated by caricaturist and illustrator C. F. Payne.

Note:  The October 3rd event at Strand is preserved on YouTube here:

Video added October 18, 2019

Quick Links to the Attempted Bloggery Archives:

Drew Friedman

Presidents

Kurt Andersen

Attempted Bloggery's Unimpeachable Index

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