This cartoon depicts a line of men waiting for food during the winter. One of them is holding a sign that says, “He kept us out of work”. This sign is a play on President Wilson’s campaign slogan, “He kept us out of war”. There were some areas of United States economy struggling in 1913, making many individuals unemployed. In 1913, many criticized President Wilson’s economic initiatives to be harmful to workers, and contributing to increased in unemployment. Such initiatives included further limiting commercial trusts and requiring investigations be made when particular businesses changed the wages of their workers. These investigations would be used to evaluate the costs of the factories, which was needed to determine guilt of criminal acts. In response to these initiatives, many factories closed operations or began to limit the changes that could be made to workers’ wages. (Summary created by Mary Delano, MU History Intern, Spring 2018)
Published in the Chicago Tribune on November 5, 1916.
"Mr. Stephens 342 Tribune Bldg"--Handwritten on verso.
"The Daily Bread Line - 1913"--Handwritten on verso.
"Nov 5 1916"--Handwritten twice on verso.
"176"--Handwritten on verso.
Pencil and ink on board.
Original in University of Missouri Special Collections, John Tinney McCutcheon Collection.
Digitized on September 2017. Equipment: Indus Color Book Scanner. Scanning software: bcs-2 version 3.4.9. Image specifications: 400 dpi, color. Access copies: tiffs with LZW compression, rotated and cropped.
Title from caption.
