The Bizarre Valentine Postcards of R.F. Outcault

By:  Kevin Grace

Postcard showing little boy crying and dogs looking onThe children are either drawn as freckle-faced street urchins or as the clean-smocked offspring of the hoity-toity.  The animals – a parrot, typically dogs – look on quizzically or crack wise.  And the occasion being Valentine’s Day, the messages are about the lovelorn and the hopeful.  These are the early 20th century postcards drawn by Richard Felton Outcault, a pioneer of the modern newspaper comic strip who gave America such literary figures as Buster Brown and The Yellow Kid.   And advertising being Richard Felton Outcaultwhat it was (and is), Buster and the Kid gave us books, shoes, coin banks, calendars, clocks, pencils, puzzles, and all manner of geegaws, selling the country on the all-American pastime of buying stuff.

But the postcards deviated from the overall merchandising a bit, although Outcault’s newspaper employers and their agents certainly generated a lot of them.  The holiday cards were something a little different, a reflection of the artist’s own attitudes to his comic Postcard showing girl kissing boy with the words, "O! Will I be your Valentine?creations.  R.F. Outcault was born in 1863, hailing from Lancaster, Ohio.  He came to Cincinnati in 1878 to attend the McMicken School of Design – which is now the Cincinnati Art Academy, though the University of Cincinnati certainly traces part of its heritage as well to the McMicken school, so in effect Outcault is a UC alumnus.  He graduated in 1881 and began his employment as a painter of bucolic scenes in the massive safes constructed by the Hall Safe and Lock Company.  Growing in local reputation, Outcault managed to land a job with the 1888 centennial industrial exposition in Cincinnati, one of the many local product fairs held in the 19th century, and which were begun as an outlet of the Ohio Mechanics Institute, founded in Child asking for a Valentine with parrot looking on1828 and now part of the University of Cincinnati’s College of Engineering and Applied Science.  At the exposition he painted scenes for Thomas Edison’s electric light displays, parlaying that into a career on the east coast with trade magazines.  Incidentally, while Edison was a telegraph operator in 1860s Cincinnati, he frequented the OMI library for his reading pleasure.

By 1894, Outcault was drawing cartoons for newspapers and magazines, particularly the New Postcard with the words "This is February 14" showing a girl and a dogYork World, the New York Journal, Judge, and the New York Herald.  It was during this time that he created his first famous character of his “Hogan’s Alley” cartoon, the Yellow Kid.  By 1902, R.F. introduced his famous Buster Brown and his faithful terrier, Tige.  And, his personal style of using panels and dialogue balloons became a standard in cartooning.

A boy in uniform giving a girl a Valentine's cardBut those strange Valentine cards?  They are unlike the sweet and lovey-dovey kids’ valentines of the late 20th century.  Instead, there is an edge to Outcault’s art, a bit of an insult here and there, and more rejection than true love.  In a way, they are an outgrowth of the so-called “Vinegar Valentines” of Victorian America.  Vinegar valentines Postcard with a girl and boy and the words "I adore you"were sarcastic and insulting, greetings designed to reject the offers of true love.  Competing with true romantic valentines, these little missives of misanthropy usually were sent anonymously to those one disliked, be they flirtatious bachelors or suffragists.   Outcault’s cards resemble them in a natural progression, one supposes, from invective to just strange little takes on the whole idea of Valentine’s Day.

Postcard with the words, "I'm thinking, thinking all the time. Of my heart's best love, my valentine." Showing young man and dogFor R.F. Outcault, his valentine postcards were done in his typical style and represent another aspect of what was a long and productive cartooning career.  Retiring from the hubbub of daily newspaper work, he spent the last decade of his life quietly painting and died in 1928.

 

New Acquisitions-DAAP Library Special Collections

A new shipment of concrete poetry books has arrived in the Robert A. Deshon and Karl J. Schlachter Library for Design, Architecture, Art and Planning (DAAP). Titles by John M. Bennett, Jim Leftwich, Robin Crozier, César Figueiredo, Serge Segay and others.

Make an appointment with Interim DAAP Library Head Elizabeth Meyer or librarian Andrea Chemero to view them.

Photo of concrete poetry book cover Wave by John M. Bennett

Wave, by John M. Bennett

"Ripening of Meat," a poem from Co-Labor-ative Writing

“Ripening of Meat,” a poem from Co-Labor-ative Writing

Co-Labor-ative Writing by Editor Luigi-Bob Drake, cover photo

Various titles from new acquisitions.

New acquisitions.

 

DAAP Library Special Collections Update

Eric Smith organizing collections.

The Robert A. Deshon and Karl J. Shlachter Library for Design, Architecture, Art and Planning (DAAP) Special Collections, which houses unique artists’ books by Sol LeWitt, Ed Ruscha and Dieter Roth, among others, was moved to a new spacious location within the DAAP Library over the winter break. This is a photo of Eric Smith (B.Des.Arch. ’19) hard at work re-shelving and organizing the collections. When the collections are ready for use, patrons may make an appointment with interim DAAP Library head Elizabeth Meyer or librarian Andrea Chemero for a viewing.

Stay warm and happy researching!  https://libraries.uc.edu/daap/Collections/special-collections.html

Art Education Exhibit in the DAAP Library

Flavia Bastos’s Art Ed. 7041 Graduate Seminar created modified books that illustrate concepts in Art Education History. Please come to the library to view this exciting and creative exhibit! (Located across from circulation desk).

exhibit of art education artists' books

Ugly Duckling Presse Exhibit in DAAP Library

A gift from Ugly Duckling Presse for DAAP Library’s Special Collections is on display now through January in the Robert A. Deshon and Karl J. Schlachter Library of DAAP.

Please come see these interesting artists’ books by some Belgian surrealists, Zahra Patterson, Joyelle McSweeney & Johannes Goransson, Stacy Szymaszek, Michalis Pichler, and Ryan Haley.

Shakespeare’s Source for Romeo and Juliet

By:  Kevin Grace

“For never was a story of more woe
Than this of Juliet and her Romeo.”

Romeo and Juliet illustrationThose are the final lines in Romeo and Juliet. The young lovers are dead, victims of their own passion and the enmity between the Capulets and the Montagues.  Though their story is set in Renaissance Verona, it could be a tale told in any culture around the world in any era of humankind.  For all the literary genius of William Shakespeare, scholars have long known that many of his plays were re-workings of stories he heard and historical accounts he read during his lifetime.  Whether it was for Hamlet, Macbeth, Richard III, Othello, or others, Shakespeare adapted these accounts for his stage in the late 16th and early 17th centuries that now have been performed countless times for more than 400 years, and over those centuries his own words have been adapted time and again.   To see King Lear presented in England or Ireland is not the same as seeing it performed in South Africa or India or China.  And of course, to see it once in England or America is not the same as seeing it once again on what might be the same stage in the same year.  William Shakespeare’s plays are paragons of beautiful language, infinite interpretation, and above all, compelling stories.

Shakespeare Extra Illustrated

Continue reading

Bernstein, Shakespeare, Preservation Photographs and Dedicated Staff are All Featured in the Latest Issue of Source

source headerRead Source, the online newsletter, to learn more about the news, events, people and happenings in UC Libraries.

In this edition of Source we celebrate Leonard Bernstein at 100 with news of an exhibit on display in the Walter C. Langsam Library. Dean Xuemao Wang writes about how the occasion of the university’s upcoming Bicentennial has led him to reflect on the contributions of four staff members retiring this fall. We announce two grants received by the National Network of Libraries of Medicine that will promote good data and good health.

University archivist and head of the Archives and Rare Books Library Kevin Grace teaches readers and students in his honors class about Extra-Illustrated Editions. Jessica Ebert, lead photographic technician in the Preservation Lab writes about her work creating visual representations of the conservation treatments performed, and housing created, in the Lab. Mike Braunlin of the John Miller Burnam Classics Library offers his experience and insights gained working in the library for 42 years. The UC Foundation writes about a unique collection gifted to the Libraries from two former professors. Lastly, the annual Books by the Banks: Cincinnati USA Books Festival, of which UC Libraries is an organizing partner, is announced in this issue.

Read these articles, as well as past issues, on the web at http://libapps.libraries.uc.edu/source/ and via e-mail. To receive Source via e-mail, contact melissa.norris@uc.edu to be added to the mailing list.

Position Opening: Digital Imaging Coordinator (3-year appointment renewable), University of Cincinnati Libraries

The University of Cincinnati Libraries is seeking a digital imaging coordinator (a 3-year, renewable position).  Within the University of Cincinnati’s Preservation Services and Lab, the person in this position coordinates the UC Libraries’ digital imaging projects and workflows, ensuring successful project completion; operates and maintains digitization equipment and software; creates imaging workflows, including image quality controls, digital conversion and production reports. The digital imaging coordinator will work in a learning environment within a highly collaborative library atmosphere to increase and enrich online access to the UC Libraries’ collection of rare and unique materials.

For more information and to apply, please visit http://bit.ly/2KMmipn.

Artifact from the Future: Summer 2018 UC Scholars Program

The Winkler Center would like to thank Nandita Baxi Sheth (DAAP) and the University of Cincinnati Scholars Program for seeking the Center’s participation in the Summer 2018 Scholars Program titled Artifact from the Future: A Trans Disciplinary Critical Inquiry Experience.

The UC Scholars Program brought Hughes STEM High School 10th and 11th grade students to the University of Cincinnati for a two-week residential, immersive summer critical thinking experience that:

  • built skills through problem based and experiential learning activities
  • provided exposure to multiple UC Colleges and Programs, degrees, and careers
  • provided on campus residential living experience
  • introduced community and industry partners
  • developed mindfulness and self-care practices
  • developed collaborative, leadership, and study skills

The program planned all these learning activities and experiences through a lens of thematic inquiry.

The theme of inquiry for the summer ‘18 Scholars was a deep consideration of the future. Using a wide-range of multimedia and disciplinary approaches including the anthropocene, speculative fiction, science fiction, afrofuturism, and technology, students delved into prospective world scenarios and dystopian futures, and were charged with developing artifacts from that future.

One stop for the scholars was the Henry R. Winkler Center for the History of the Health Professions.  There, curator, Gino Pasi, gave a workshop for the students which included an introduction to archives, curatorship and public history, and a brief overview of what it is the Winkler Center actually does. Students then were introduced to health science-related artifacts from the past.

Student examines a kymograph (an early blood pressure montoring device) at the Winkler Center

Students are introduced to artifacts at the Winkler Center

After that, four teams of scholars were created and each team received an artifact to examine, describe, and then use in a story, play, poem, or some other written work to be presented at the end of the workshop.  The Winkler Center objects given to the students included the “iron lung,” an electro-convulsive therapy unit, a baby incubator from the 1950s, and a “quackery” cure-all from the 1930s called the Electraply. Amazingly each team described and guessed the proper uses of each artifact without any hints or clues.

 

A team examines the Iron Lung.

Students work to describe there artifacts.

Another team examines the “Electraply” device

We hope the students enjoyed not only their Winkler Center experience, but also the rest of their time here at UC. We hope to see them here in the future. For more on this year’s scholars program see:  https://www.rtefakt.org/

Read about Preserving Taft, the Writing of E.B. White and the Digital Scholarship Center in Source.

source vol 16 no2Read Source, the online newsletter, to learn more about the news, events, people and happenings in UC Libraries.

This latest issue of Source includes a feature on the work of the Preservation Lab and their collaboration with the Archives and Rare Books Library on a collection about William Howard Taft. Xuemao Wang, dean and university librarian, talks about how libraries need to adapt for the future. Kevin Grace, university archivist and head of the Archives and Rare Books Library, writes about a collection centered around children’s books author and co-writer of The Elements of Style, E.B. White. A grant from The Andrew Mellon Foundation in support of the Digital Scholarship Center’s research on machine learning and data visualization in multiple disciplines in the humanities and beyond is announced. Dean Wang and Liz Scarpelli, director of the University of Cincinnati Press are interviewed about the progress of the Press one year in. Gino Pasi, archivist and curator for the Henry R. Winkler Center for the History of the Health Professions, writes about a set of historical and important surgery films recently digitized and made available. Other articles announce the Libraries’s Adopt-a-Book program and the 2016/17 Annual Progress Report.

Read these articles, as well as past issues, on the web at http://libapps.libraries.uc.edu/source/ and via e-mail. To receive Source via e-mail, contact melissa.norris@uc.edu to be added to the mailing list.