Is this 1921 cartoon the first ever meme?

BBC ^ | 04/16/2018 | Staff

[Red Badger]

Is this 1921 cartoon the first recorded meme?

When this comic was posted to Twitter, it caused excitement as people began to wonder if it was the first meme - a format-dependent joke, typically of a picture with a caption or subtitle - ever published.

But we've found a version of the joke using the same format printed at least a year earlier in either 1919 or 1920.

Both draw from the same template of the 'Expectations vs. Reality' joke, which contrasts two pictures side-by-side with an obvious discrepancy between them.

It was subsequently reposted with new captions such as "you/the guy she tells you not to worry about", referencing yet another contemporary template meme.

Some users created their own takes on the format using other memes such as 'If You Don't Love Me / Can't Handle Me'.

[rdl6989]

I’ve never heard of a photograph called a “flashlight”, but I know they call a flashlight a torch.

[buffaloguy]

Not even close. The meme goes way back.

[Red Badger]

Dictionary
flash·light

noun
noun: flashlight; plural noun: flashlights

1.
North American
a battery-operated portable light.
2.
a flashing light used for signals and in lighthouses.
3.
a light giving an intense flash, used for photographing at night or indoors.

[PLMerite]

Probably a flash bulb. They would have been new-ish then.

[Red Badger]

Yes, they brought that out in the rest of the story...................

[eastforker]

Not to mention flash powder was used in flash pans before the flash bulb.

[Red Badger]

A friend of mine nearly burned his face off with some homemade ‘flash powder’ when his cigarette ash fell into a saucer with some in it................

[Big Red Badger]

meme....

Is derived from...What?

The descriptive comes from Where?

[sparklite2]

Irmagerd! Irmamim!!

[sparklite2]

Did you read your own article?

[fruser1]

Here's an earlier one: First me live, then me dead.

[subterfuge]

How so? The word meme wasn’t invented until 1967 by an atheist. It’s a goofy word.

[fruser1]

First selfies:

[Red Badger]

meme mēm/ noun noun: meme; plural noun: memes an element of a culture or system of behavior that may be considered to be passed from one individual to another by nongenetic means, especially imitation. a humorous image, video, piece of text, etc., that is copied (often with slight variations) and spread rapidly by Internet users. Origin 1970s: from Greek mimēma ‘that which is imitated,’ on the pattern of gene .

[Red Badger]

We’re two different Red Badgers...........

[9422WMR]

“Poor soul, he was just not that bright. A real flash in the pan.”
Refered to a camera device from the old days.

[outofsalt]

If only I was half the man my dog thinks I am...

[laker_dad]

Origin and Etymology of flash in the pan

from the firing of the priming in the pan of a flintlock musket without discharging the piece

First Known Use: 1706

[eastforker]

Depends on the reference. As such, a flash in the pan was also used to describe only a hint of success, such as in panning for gold.