The FReeper Foxhole - Dr. Seuss Went to War - September 26th, 2004

see educational sources

[snippy_about_it]

Theodor Seuss Geisel









During WW II, Geisel joined the army and was sent to Hollywood. Captain Geisel would write for Frank Capra's Signal Corps Unit (for which he won the Legion of Merit) and do documentaries (he won Oscar's for Hitler Lives and Design for Death). He also created a cartoon called Gerald McBoing-Boing which also won him an Oscar.



In May of 1954, Life published a report concerning illiteracy among school children. The report said, among other things, that children were having trouble to read because their books were boring. This inspired Geisel's publisher, and prompted him to send Geisel a list of 400 words he felt were important, asked him to cut the list to 250 words (the publishers idea of how many words at one time a first grader could absorb), and write a book. Nine months later, Geisel, using 220 of the words given to him published The Cat in the Hat, which went on to instant success.

In 1960 Bennett Cerf bet Geisel $50 that he couldn't write an entire book using only fifty words. The result was Green Eggs and Ham. Cerf never paid the $50, btw...

Helen Palmer Geisel died in 1967. Theodor Geisel married Audrey Stone Diamond in 1968. Theodor Seuss Geisel died 24 September 1991.

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Today's Educational Sources and suggestions for further reading:

http://orpheus.ucsd.edu/speccoll/dspolitic/
www.abc.net.au/rn/arts/sunmorn/stories/s1093523.htm

[snippy_about_it]

Before Dr. Seuss was Dr. Seuss, he was Theodor Giesel, and before he achieved tremendous fame for his unconventional children's books, he drew unconventional political cartoons for PM, a left-wing daily newspaper in New York. Minear's book, Dr. Seuss Goes to War, returns these cartoons, representing a little-known period in the creative life of Dr. Seuss, to the attention of an American public who knows him only for the Cat in the Hat and the Whos of Who-ville.

Like most of Dr. Seuss's later works, these cartoons educate as they entertain. They also exhibit his characteristic style and talent, with people, animals, and imaginary creatures that will look quite at home on the pages of Horton Hears a Who nearly twenty years later.

The years 1941-1942, when Dr. Seuss was drawing for PM, fell right in the heart of World War II and provided more than enough fodder for his political cartooning. Though Hitler found his way into the largest number of Dr. Seuss cartoons, the artist also found room over the coals for Stalin, Mussolini, "Japan," and French premier Laval. One cartoon in particular even suggests the fate of Jews under Hitler. Hitler and Laval stand together in a grove of trees from which hang the bodies of ten Jews. With their lynching done, Hitler and Laval sing together from a piece of sheet music, "Only God can make a tree/To furnish sport for you and me!" (p.101) Though according to Minear, "this is Dr. Seuss's only cartoon dealing with Jewish deaths in Europe" (p.77), a number of his cartoons address the "racial hatred" Hitler was fomenting in Europe, and the anti-Semitism and anti-black racism prevalent in the United States.

In fact, Dr. Seuss shows no mercy for any of America's internal enemies, drawing into the fray anyone against the war effort. From the anti-Semitism and racism exhibited by the common American to the vitriol hurled by Father Coughlin, Dr. Seuss exposes the damage and divisiveness such ideas can bring. He even wielded his pen against Charles A. Lindbergh, once a hero for the first trans-Atlantic flight but here vilified for his anti-interventionist and anti-Semitic ideas. Shockingly, however, Dr. Seuss's racial openness did not extend to Japanese-Americans, whom he unjustifiably portrayed as just another of America's internal enemies, showing them in one cartoon lined up from Washington State to California to get TNT while "waiting for the signal from home" (p.65).

Minear begins each chapter of this book with an essay placing Dr. Seuss's editorial cartoons in context. Portions of these essays explore Dr. Seuss's political vision over the course of his two years at PM and also how his drawings reflect the American response to the War. In the course of these essays, Minear often refers to specific cartoons within the book's collection, analyzing the imagery and fixing these drawings among the others, deftly illuminating the details for those who want to do more than just browse the collection. The cartoons themselves are sequenced in a way that supports these essays, but Minear also includes a chronological list of the cartoons, providing a way to track a bit of the history of the War through the eyes of Dr. Seuss. With 200 cartoons reproduced in Minear's work, it is certainly an interesting and insightful view.

240 pages
200 b&w illustrations
ISBN: 1-56584-565-X
Call no: D745.2 M56 1999

[snippy_about_it]

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[snippy_about_it]

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UPDATED THROUGH APRIL 2004



The FReeper Foxhole. America's History. America's Soul

Click on Hagar for
"The FReeper Foxhole Compiled List of Daily Threads"

[SAMWolf]

Morning Snippy.

Interesting thread.

[snippy_about_it]

Thanks Sam.

It's good to be home isn't it.

Good night.

[SAMWolf]

Yep, but I keep thinking of all the things we need to get done.

Good Night.

[HuntsvilleTxVeteran]

Great, Thanks
I had no idea, I thought he was just a children's cartoonist.
Many of his wartime cartoons could be used now.
Brass knuckles and Big Bertha are great.

[GailA]

Good morning, going to be another lazy hazy fall day here in Memphis it looks like.

[Aeronaut]

Good morning Snippy.

[Soaring Feather]

Good Sunday morning everyone!
Welcome home Sam and snippy!

[SAMWolf]

Morning HuntsvilleTxVeteran.

When Snippy told me she was working on this thread is the first time I heard that Dr. Seuss was a wartime/political cartoonist. He definately blasted the isolationists.

[alfa6]

Ted Geisel was in adverising prior to his childrens books. There was a story about him in Readers Digest a few years back about how he had won an award for an ad campaign for Flit, a bug powder. As part of the campaign they devised a sprayer that sort of looked like a gun. The award was a "Flit" gun that had been mounted on a plaque. So he going to get on his plane for the trip home and the young security guard won't let him on the plane with his "gun". Geisel explains to the young'un about the "Flit" gun but nope it's a gun and he cam't get on the plane. Finally Ted Geisel asks the young'ub if he has an old timer secuity guard and could he come over. The old timer shows up a few minutes later, takes one look at the plague, starts laughing and says basically,"Hey I haven't seen a Flit gun in years" Mr Geisel got on the plane. Here are a couple of Dr Suess's cartoons about Flit



Regards

alfa6 ;>}

[SAMWolf]

Morning GailA. Fall looks like it's starting to show up here too, at least the early morings.

[SAMWolf]

Morning aeronaut.

[SAMWolf]

AWWWW, Thanks Feather. It's feels good to be back.

[E.G.C.]

Good morning, snippy and everyone at the Freeper foxhole.

[Aeronaut]

Hi Sam.

[SAMWolf]

Morning alfa6

Thanks for the background on "Flit". Turns out Dr. Seuss was more interesting than I ever knew.

[SAMWolf]

Morning E.G.C.