Additional Cartoons, Research, and Acknowledgments

Acknowledgments…

Kevin Bailey, MA, the Center for the Study of Tobacco and Society’s collection manager and digital archivist from 2019 to 2022, designed this online exhibition. Bryce Callahan provided invaluable technical assistance in 2022. Lori Jacobi, MA, the Center’s collection manager from 2003 to 2008, catalogued and preserved the artworks and correspondence. She also oversaw the installation of the exhibition at the University of Alabama Museum of Natural History and handled all arrangements with the eight other exhibition venues across the country. Kapita Shah created an initial database of cartoons in the collection in 1997. Rachel Tate created the digital file for the cartoons of Wayne Stayskal in 2003. Brian Fair of Cagle Cartoons (https://caglecartoons.com/) facilitated the updating of this exhibition in 2021. Members of the Association of American Editorial Cartoonists (AAEC) have given their encouragement and support, notably Joel Pett (host of the 2004 AAEC convention during which “Cartoonists Take Up Smoking” debuted at the Ann Tower Gallery), Mike Ritter, David Horsey, Scott Stantis, Paul Fell, Matt Bors, Ted Rall, Ed Stein, Draper Hill, Ed Lange, Milt Priggee, V. Cullum Rogers, J.D. Crowe, Steve Benson, Kirk Anderson, David Fitzsimmons, Chip Bok, Walt Handelsman, Jimmie Margulies, Randy Bish, Rob Rogers, Tim Menees, Jim Larrick, Dennis Draughon, Signe Wilkinson, Etta Hulme, Dick Locher, and others. Editorial cartoon curators Lucy Caswell,  Jenny Dietzen, and Sylvia Rhor provided invaluable advice. Funding from the Flight Attendant Research Institute (FAMRI) helped support the research for this exhibition and acquisition of many of the original artworks. The Herb Block Foundation helped defray the cost of the installation of the exhibition at the National Museum of Health and Medicine, directed by Dr. Adrianne Noe.

About the collection…

The Editorial Cartoons on Smoking Collection comprises satirical artworks by more than 100 editorial cartoonists from American and Canadian daily newspapers from the 1960s to the present. The collection includes 25 boxes with the following: the exhibition “Cartoonists Take Up Smoking,” consisting of over 120 original artworks (individually acquired by Alan Blum, MD directly from the artists) and the newspaper headlines that inspired these cartoons; 132 additional original cartoons not in the exhibition; over 1000 uncut newspaper editorial pages with cartoons, organized by artists; and local materials related to numerous showings of “Cartoonists Take Up Smoking” in the US. Other parts of the collection include every issue of MAD Magazine from the 1950s to the early-2000’s that featured satirical content related to smoking and cigarette advertising; numerous issues of BALLYHOO, a 1930s forerunner of MAD that featured parodies of cigarette advertisements; and unsorted boxes of an estimated 1500 uncatalogued newspaper and magazine single panel and strip cartoons on smoking. The exhibition has distilled editorial cartoonists’ humor, satire, parody, and ridicule of tobacco’s aspects, from seedling to tumor. Few sectors of society were spared in the failure to end the smoking pandemic – including tobacco executives, other business allies, politicians, organized medicine, the mass media, and even the anti-smoking movement.

Curator’s comments on the origins of this exhibition (14:28)

Erratum: I twice mention the name Don Shoemaker when I meant to say Don Wright, editorial cartoonist of The Miami News and The Palm Beach Post. Don Shoemaker was the editorial page editor of The Miami Herald. AB

Slideshow: “Cartoonists Take Up Smoking–A History of Political Satire and Tobacco”

The slideshow above includes all of the images in my first invited presentation on editorial cartoons about smoking, given at the combined annual convention of the Association of American Editorial Cartoonists and the Association of Canadian Editorial Cartoonists on June 29, 2001 in Toronto. The images have been newly scanned from the original artworks or newsprint copies from the date of publication. Over 250 other cartoons from the Center’s collection have been added and grouped by theme.

Slides 1-200
Slides 201-404

Audio recording: “Cartoonists Take Up Smoking–A History of Political Satire and Tobacco” Part I

Audio recording: “Cartoonists Take Up Smoking–A History of Political Satire and Tobacco” Part II

List of themes of smoking-related editorial cartoons (1 page)

The artists’ statements (22 pages)

Photographs of The Center for the Study of Tobacco Editorial Cartoons on Smoking Collection

Inventory of the editorial cartoons in the collection alphabetically by artist (34 pages)

55 themes of the editorial cartoons by keywords (91 pages)

Final list of editorial cartoons by theme (40 pages)

The Center for the Study of Tobacco Editorial Cartoons on Smoking Collection

Letter from Lesa Bossone to Alan Blum, MD about membership in the Association of American Editorial Cartoonists (AAEC), May 11, 1999 (2 pages)

(Dr. Blum was an associate member of AAEC from 1999-2008)

Excerpt of 2003-2004 AAEC Membership Directory (2 pages)

Excerpt of curator’s working copy of 2003-2004 AAEC Membership Directory (2 pages)

Columbia Scholastic Press Conference, 1965

Curator’s autobiographical footnote: As co-editor and editorial cartoonist of my high school newspaper, The Echo of Woodmere Academy (Woodmere, New York), I gave a presentation about creating editorial cartoons at the Columbia Scholastic Press Conference on March 13, 1965. AB

The opening reception for “Cartoonists Take Up Smoking” at the Ann Tower Gallery, Lexington, Kentucky, April 21, 2004, during the annual convention of the Association of American Editorial Cartoonists.