In this 1884 Puck cover, artist Bernhard Gillam ridicules political posturing through a would-be statesman styled as a Don Quixote–like wandering knight. Mounted on horseback and draped in banners of empty “issues,” he charges forward on spectacle alone, while his page staggers behind beneath the weight of slogans and props.
The cartoon reduces politics to performance. Substance gives way to display, and ambition is armored with noise rather than ideas. Through exaggerated costume and mock-heroic pose, Puck exposes how Gilded Age politics often rewarded theatrics over responsibility—a joke that still lands.
Casewrap sewn binding | Vibrant, crisp vintage tones | Ruled | 5x7 in.
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In this August 10, 1887 Puck cover by Joseph Keppler, a political matron labeled “Ohio” physically pushes John Sherman forward, presenting him less as an independent candidate than as a managed figure. In the background, a bored party official leans from a window marked “Endorsement,” signaling support without effort or conviction.
The cartoon treats politics as theater. Sherman is staged, endorsements are routine, and public life is reduced to performance. Through exaggerated gesture and visible control, Puck suggests that machine politics replaced genuine democratic choice with choreography.
Real ink. Real artists. Real archives. Revived for a democracy worth defending.
Casewrap sewn binding | Vibrant, crisp vintage tones | Ruled | 5x7 in.
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In this 1887 Puck satire by Louis M. Dalrymple, a small political figure is dragged helplessly down the street by a monstrous kettle labeled Notoriety, with the strap of Excommunication snapping behind it. It’s a sharp visual jab at the way public scandal takes on a life of its own, exposing how institutions—especially religious ones—often use moral condemnation to inflate minor controversies into full-blown spectacles.
The cartoon skewers the mechanics of power: the frenzy of notoriety, the theatrics of punishment, and the eagerness of authorities to weaponize shame. More than a century later, the dynamic is as familiar as ever.
Casewrap sewn binding | Vibrant, crisp vintage tones | Blank | 5x7 in.
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This 1889 Judge magazine cover illustrated by Victor Gillam turns the autumn elections into a baseball showdown—one where the Republican Party can’t keep its head in the game. The elephant at the plate, dressed in full GOP uniform, is surrounded by opponents ready to capitalize on every mistake, while the caption warns that the party is playing so carelessly it risks being “struck out.” It’s classic Gilded Age political satire: sharp, funny, and brutally honest about how complacency and corruption undermine a democracy. Over a century later, the message still holds—authoritarian movements thrive when the party in power stops playing by the rules and starts taking voters for granted.
A perfect piece of authentic resistance art from 1889—real ink, real artists, real archives.
Casewrap sewn binding | Vibrant, crisp vintage tones | Blank | 5x7 in.
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Santa Claus in a Quandary appeared in Judge Magazine during the height of the Gilded Age fights over the Republican “spoils system.” Here, President Benjamin Harrison—drawn by Bernhard Gillam as a weary Santa—staggers under the weight of impossible political demands, while party bosses Platt and Foraker lurk in the trees demanding their cut of federal appointments. The oversized basket labeled “Fill her right up or you are another political failure” nails the point: corruption wasn’t subtle, it was expected. Judge’s artists used holiday whimsy to expose a very real political rot—how patronage, party pressure, and back-room dealmaking strangled the public interest.
More than a century later, the dynamic is painfully familiar: authoritarian movements thrive when loyalty matters more than competence and when political bosses treat democracy like a gift bag to divide among themselves.
A sharp piece of historical resistance art, perfect for anyone who believes good governance beats corruption every time.
Casewrap sewn binding | Vibrant, crisp vintage tones | Blank | 5x7 in.
Published on December 23, 1891, this Puck cover lampoons one of the most dreaded editorial rituals of the era: slogging through the president’s annual message. An exhausted editor battles a never-ending scroll of dry facts, figures, and political boilerplate, scissors in hand, condemned to cut it down for readers who no longer care to read it at all.
The cartoon nails the disconnect between political leaders who produce grand, verbose statements and the people tasked with making sense of them. Bureaucratic drama piles up while the public tunes out, leaving editors, journalists, and ordinary citizens overwhelmed by noise instead of clarity.
Casewrap sewn binding | Vibrant, crisp vintage tones | Ruled | 5x7 in.
This 1891 Judge illustration by Grant E. Hamilton captures the fatigue of political journalism during an era dominated by endless stump speeches and partisan rhetoric. Inside the editorial office of a Democratic newspaper, a weary editor is buried beneath towering piles of speeches from President Benjamin Harrison, each tied to cities across the country. At his side stands a caricatured Harrison figure hauling armfuls of encyclopedias, a visual jab at how heavily the president relied on prepared, scripted addresses.
Judge uses humor here to highlight a familiar tension: the struggle of editors to interpret, critique, and keep pace with an overwhelming political message machine. The image reflects a broader frustration with formulaic political communication and the drudgery of campaigning in the late nineteenth century.
Drawn from an issue preserved in the archives, this journal offers a snapshot of American political satire at a moment when newspapers served as the primary arena for national debate. A distinctive companion for notes, writing, or everyday planning.
Metal spiral binding | Interior document pocket | Ruled | 6x8 in.
In this 1891 Judge cartoon, Victor Gillam depicts a parade of political insiders trudging through the snow toward the gates of “Miss Columbia,” only to find a sign that reads: “Not at home this year.” The message was sharp then and sharper now—when corruption, entitlement, and backroom influence start lining up for their usual privileges, a healthy democracy has every right to slam the gate shut.
This artwork poked fun at the power brokers who thought the nation owed them access. Today, it reads like a reminder that the republic belongs to the people, not to the grifters, deal-makers, and would-be authoritarians who keep trying to sneak in through the side door.
Casewrap sewn binding | Vibrant, crisp vintage tones | Blank | 5x7 in.
In this 1891 Judge cover by Bernhard Gillam, titled “The Duet of the Saint and the Sinner,” a monk and a court jester—moral opposites by design—attempt to play from the same sheet of music. The pairing is deliberately absurd: sanctity and spectacle staged side by side, forced into a single performance.
The joke is visual and direct. Harmony is announced rather than achieved, and agreement appears as display rather than order. By setting the saint and the sinner together, Gillam turns cooperation into farce, suggesting that unity proclaimed across incompatible roles is more theater than governance.
Casewrap sewn binding | Vibrant, crisp vintage tones | Ruled | 5x7 in.
In this 1891 Judge cartoon illustrated by Victor Gillam, Grover Cleveland appears as a showy jackdaw parading in borrowed peacock feathers—each labeled with a different state election. The joke is simple and brutal: a politician trying to claim victories he didn’t actually win.
More than a century later, the image lands with the same force. American politics is still full of figures who take credit for other people’s work, rewrite outcomes to suit their narrative, and strut like winners no matter what the truth is. If anything, today’s authoritarian-leaning politicians have perfected this move—declaring triumph where there was none, spinning losses into “stolen victories,” and treating democratic processes as props for personal glory.
Casewrap sewn binding | Vibrant, crisp vintage tones | Blank | 5x7 in.
This sweeping two-page Puck illustration captures the full energy and contradiction of American public life in the early 1890s. Joseph Keppler fills the scene with a dense crowd of characters—politicians, immigrants, performers, soldiers, photographers, and everyday strivers—each animated under the shade of two large trees by the water. The composition unfolds as a lively panorama of humor, ambition, and social tension, rendered with Puck’s characteristic blend of mischief and sharp observation.
At first glance, it resembles a festive gathering. Look closer and it becomes a commentary on how national myths are staged, who participates in the civic spectacle, and how easily public enthusiasm spills into disorder. Keppler’s work has a way of exposing the performance of power with clarity and wit.
Drawn from an original issue preserved in the archives, this journal carries forward the color, movement, and crowded storytelling of one of Puck’s most ambitious ensemble scenes. A distinctive companion for notes, ideas, or daily reflections.
Casewrap sewn binding | Vibrant, crisp vintage tones | Blank | 5x7 in.
Published in July 1896 in Judge, this large-format cartoon anticipates imperial conflict before it arrives, responding directly to the Venezuelan Question while widening its critique to empire more broadly. European powers and the United States appear as caricatured figures advancing with official statements rather than weapons, as a dark shadow stretches between them, signaling consequences already in motion.
Drawn by Grant E. Hamilton, the image targets rhetoric instead of combat. Authority speaks in proclamations, but the direction of power is already visible. Appearing nearly two years before the Spanish-American War, the cartoon reflects a strain of American satire skeptical of expansionist logic and the claims used to justify it.
Original illustration from an 1896 issue of Judge, preserved as an archival artifact of anti-imperial dissent.
Casewrap sewn binding | Vibrant, crisp vintage tones | Ruled | 5x7 in.
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This 1897 Puck cover turns a Fourth of July celebration into a visual complaint. Louis M. Dalrymple’s Uncle Sam struggles to light a rocket labeled “Prosperity,” while dark storm clouds marked “Tariff for Trusts” gather overhead. The scene suggests a holiday weighed down by economic policy rather than lifted by it.
The satire is blunt and symbolic. National optimism sputters as protection and monopoly overshadow public benefit. By staging celebration under threatening skies, Puck frames prosperity as something promised but difficult to launch—especially when burdened by the interests it is meant to restrain.
Casewrap sewn binding | Vibrant, crisp vintage tones | Ruled | 5x7 in.
Published in Puck during the Spanish–American War, this 1898 cartoon by Louis M. Dalrymple critiques the growing power of yellow journalism to intrude on political decision-making. President William McKinley reviews his war plans as a sensationalist press figure—labeled “Yellow Journalism War Plan”—forces himself through the window, embodying media pressure disguised as public demand.
Rather than celebrating conflict, the image warns how manufactured outrage and spectacle can push a nation toward war. Drawn from the original pages of Puck, it remains a pointed reminder of how easily propaganda can overtake restraint.
Metal spiral binding | Interior document pocket | Ruled | 6x8 in.
This 1915 cover from La Baïonnette, illustrated by Louis Renéfer, turns aerial warfare into bitter farce. As soldiers fire wildly at unseen planes, civilians scatter in panic—children, women, and bystanders caught in the absurd logic of modern war. The original caption reassures onlookers, “Don’t be afraid… they don’t kill civilians,” a line made brutally ironic by the chaos unfolding below.
French wartime satire at its sharpest, exposing how easily civilians become collateral in the name of progress.
Casewrap sewn binding | Vibrant, crisp vintage tones | Ruled | 5x7 in.
Drawn by Léonnec for a 1915 issue of La Baïonnette, this illustration shifts attention away from the battlefield to a private moment inside a hospital ward. A nurse, still in uniform, pauses to adjust her stockings, her posture poised between fatigue and composure.
The caption frames the contrast directly: public heroism versus private vulnerability. Decorated service and daily strain sit side by side, rendered with gentle humor rather than mockery. By focusing on an unguarded gesture, La Baïonnette captures the human cost of wartime service without spectacle.
Metal spiral binding | Front illustration and dark grey back cover | Interior document pocket | 6x8 in.
Drawn by Sobek for a 1915 wartime issue of La Baïonnette, this interior illustration shows a nurse paused while reading a letter from the front. Her posture is steady, but her expression carries the weight of fatigue and restraint.
The caption supplies the dark irony: the soldier writes that he has received both a medal and grievous injury at once. Understatement collides with brutality. With minimal gesture and muted tone, the image exposes the human cost of war through stillness rather than spectacle.
Metal spiral binding | Front illustration and dark grey back cover | Interior document pocket | 6x8 in.
Illustrated by Louis Icart, this 1915 La Baïonnette cartoon punctures the superstition and bravado that often accompany war. A uniformed officer tumbles helplessly through the air, clutching his “lucky charm” as weapons, symbols, and personal effects scatter above the battlefield below. The joke is blunt and unsparing: talismans, rituals, and authority offer no protection once violence takes over.
Like much of La Baïonnette’s wartime satire, the image refuses heroic consolation, exposing how easily faith in symbols collapses under real conditions of war.
Metal spiral binding | Interior document pocket | Ruled | 6x8 in.
This 1916 page from La Baïonnette, illustrated by Jacques Nam, presents a compact allegory of wartime transformation. In the upper panel, Médor lies at ease, a domestic companion guarding private virtue. Below, the same dog stands alert and watchful, recast as a sentinel of national duty. The caption makes the shift explicit: “Before, I guarded Ninette’s virtue. Now, I guard the honor of France.”
Simple and striking, the image reflects how war quietly redraws the boundaries between private life and public obligation. Loyalty, once personal and familiar, is redefined as a national resource. Without depicting battle or heroics, the cartoon captures the moral logic of total war, where even everyday symbols are pressed into service.
Casewrap sewn binding | Vibrant, crisp vintage tones | Ruled | 5x7 in.
Designed by Lucien-Henri Weiluc for a 1916 issue of La Baïonnette, this cover condenses wartime censorship into a single, exaggerated gesture. A wide-eyed figure presses a finger to her lips beneath the command Taisez-vous! Méfiez-vous!—“Keep quiet. Be careful.”
The image turns instruction into satire. Silence becomes performative, caution exaggerated, and vigilance visibly anxious. With distortion and direct address, La Baïonnette captures how censorship on the home front seeped into everyday expression, shaping speech through fear as much as decree.
Casewrap sewn binding | Vibrant, crisp vintage tones | Ruled | 5x7 in.
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This 1916 La Baïonnette illustration by Sacha Zaliouk presents a lineup of “undesirables”: financiers, profiteers, and political operators rendered as exposed heads, stripped of setting and pretense. Each face is isolated and economically drawn, inviting recognition rather than explanation.
The satire relies on accumulation. No single figure dominates; together they form a type—the familiar human inventory of wartime corruption. The original caption openly wishes that the winds of war might rid society of them for good, turning caricature into judgment rather than humor.
Revived now as a reminder that corruption never really disappears, but history always keeps the receipts.
Casewrap sewn binding | Vibrant, crisp vintage tones | Ruled | 5.75×8 in.
Illustrated by Fabien Fabiano in January 1917, this La Baïonnette cover captures a quieter side of the First World War. A decorated French soldier smiles while holding a small portrait of a woman—treated less as a keepsake than as a lucky charm.
Titled Fétiches et Mascottes, the image reflects how wartime culture encouraged soldiers to carry talismans and symbolic objects as emotional stabilizers. Affection becomes portable; intimacy is reduced to an image meant to steady men amid industrial violence.
Casewrap sewn binding | Vibrant, crisp vintage tones | Ruled
Illustrated by Jacques Nam, this January 10, 1917 centerpiece from La Baïonnette assembles a loose inventory of the fetishes, mascots, and symbolic figures that circulated through the French army during the First World War. Animals, caricatures, and objects appear side by side, each labeled or implied as a bearer of meaning, luck, or morale.
Rather than depicting combat or command, the image treats superstition and symbolism as ordinary features of wartime life. Official insignia, private rituals, and humorous stand-ins occupy the same visual space, without hierarchy or emphasis.
Casewrap sewn binding | Vibrant, crisp vintage tones | Ruled | 5x7 in.
Automatic bundle pricing applies when two journals are added.
Published during the First World War, this illustration from La Baïonnette sets domestic calm against the language of wartime heroism. A woman reclines reading, surrounded by resting animals, while stylized wings frame the scene beneath the caption “Aux aviateurs, rien d’impossible” (“For aviators, nothing is impossible”).
Rather than celebrating flight or military achievement, the image deflates heroic rhetoric through contrast. Ordinary life remains untroubled, intimate, and unmoved, quietly puncturing inflated claims of progress and glory.
Created by Jacques Nam, the illustration reflects a strain of wartime satire in which irony, not spectacle, becomes a form of resistance.
Metal spiral binding | Interior document pocket | Ruled | 6x8 in.
Automatic bundle pricing applies when two journals are added.
WHY THIS OBJECT EXISTS
During the First World War, satire became one of the few public ways to speak plainly about power, bureaucracy, and survival. This image belongs to that moment. Owning it isn’t about nostalgia for Chaplin or caricature — it’s about keeping a visual language of dissent present in everyday life.
WHAT YOU’RE BUYING
An archival illustration adapted for practical use. Not decorative. Not neutral. Meant to be handled, written in, and lived with.
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This 1917 cover from La Baïonnette introduces Pierre-Henri Cami’s satirical feature “Charlot correspondant de Guerre,” a wartime send-up of Charlie Chaplin’s iconic screen persona. The original French subtitle, “texte et dessins de Cami” (text and drawings by Cami), signals the issue’s focus on Charlot as a caricatured war correspondent navigating the absurdities of military life.
The back cover reproduces a page from the same 22 March 1917 issue, including Cami’s line drawings and French dialogue, preserving the texture and humor of the publication as it originally appeared. Together, the front and back covers form a small archival object from a moment when European satire met the theatricality of power with ink, irony, and invention.
See the full Cami: Charlie Chaplin Collection here
Casewrap sewn binding | Vibrant, crisp vintage tones | Ruled | 5x7 in.
Produced in small batches from archival sources. Availability varies.
