On this day in 1813, the United States gets its nickname, Uncle Sam.The name is linked to Samuel Wilson, a meat packer from Troy, New York, who supplied barrels of beef to the United States Army during the War of 1812. Wilson (1766-1854) stamped the barrels with "U.S."for United States, but soldiers began referring to the grub as "Uncle Sam's." The local newspaper picked up on the story and Uncle Sam eventually gained widespread acceptance as the nickname for the U.S.federal government.
In the late 1860s and 1870s, political cartoonist Thomas Nast(1840-1902) began popularizing the image of Uncle Sam. Nast continued to evolve the image, eventually giving Sam the white beard and stars-and-stripes suit that are associated with the character today.
3 comments:
Thomas Nast is an incredible artist. Although he's well-known for his political cartoons (I used to have an entire volume of T. Nast's cartoons)--you have to search the entire cartoon to find unexpected "commentary" drawings within the main cartoon) he was an illustrator for many children's books. I had his illustrated 'Twas the Night Before Christmas. Maybe Kyle & Beth can saearch the internet encyclopedia to find our more about him. T. Nash "crates" on paper like Kyle "creates" with his blocks.
Thanks, Debbie, for that. I often wondered how it came to be:)
Thanks for the history! Very interesting!
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