Land of Lore & Legend - Wlliam Gropper's Folklore Map of America
- Title:
- Land of Lore & Legend - Wlliam Gropper's Folklore Map of America
- Alternate Title:
- Wlliam Gropper's Folklore Map of America
- Collection:
- Persuasive Maps: PJ Mode Collection
- Creator:
- Gropper, William
- Date:
- 1946
- Posted Date:
- 2017-04-14
- ID Number:
- 1332.01
- Collection Number:
- 8548
- File Name:
- PJM_1332_01.jpg
- Style/Period:
- 1940 - 1959
- Subject:
- Pictorial
Ethnocentrism - Measurement:
- 35 x 53 (centimeters, height x width)
- Notes:
- As a "nation of immigrants," Americans have produced persuasive maps addressing the issues of immigration and nationality over most of the country's lifetime. The collection includes a number of these maps published since the 1840s. Some are welcoming, encouraging, and provide advice to immigrants. Some assert that the diversity of our nationalities is a source of strength for the country. And yet others attack immigrants in general, or specific ethnic or religious immigrant groups, particularly Asians, Catholics, and Jews. For the range of these maps, Search > "immigration.”
This map is a bold celebration of America in the aftermath of victory in World War II, part of the effort to strengthen the nation at home and abroad.
During World War II, the well-known Brooklyn artist William Gropper volunteered his services to the Treasury Department and the White House Office of War Information, illustrating a number of posters and other materials for which he received a citation and the personal thanks of President Roosevelt. In 1946, Associated American Artists published a very large, inexpensive reproduction of "William Gropper’s America: Its Folklore," a painting he had completed the previous year. For years, this illustration was widely circulated and used throughout the country, particularly in schools and libraries. From 1946 to 1953 the U.S. Department of State's Overseas Library Program distributed more than 1,700 copies of it around the world, as part of an effort to circulate "facts and solidly documented explanations of the United States." Wyatt 2017. This version of the map appeared in Holiday Magazine for September, 1946, along with a one-page profile characterizing Gropper as a "first-class, hard-working, fight-picking" crusader.
Alas, this “cartographic darling fell from grace” in 1953, when Senator Joseph McCarthy’s lawyer Roy Cohn found it in State Department libraries abroad and labeled Gropper one of the “fringe supporters and sympathizers” of Communism whose works had infected the State Department. Wyatt 2017. Gropper was pilloried in televised congressional testimony, forced to take the Fifth Amendment, and earned the dubious distinction of being one the first artists or the era to be blacklisted. The State Department and many other institutions destroyed the copies of this work still in their possession.
For an earlier, more radical Gropper map, see ID #2407, "This Cock-Eyed World" (1926).
During the period leading up to World War II and through the end of the war, a number of maps celebrated the unity, strength and confidence of the nation. Many of these were published in leading magazines of the time. The collection includes several examples: ID #1275.01-.04, Life Magazine, “America’s Future” (1939); ID #1288, “America - A Nation of One People From Many Countries” (1940); ID #1314, Esquire Magazine, Miguel Covarrubias (1943); ID #2019, “Animated North America” (1944);ID #1332, Holiday Magazine, “William Gropper’s Folklore Map of America” (1946).
For further information on the Collector’s Notes and a Feedback/Contact Link, see https://persuasivemaps.library.cornell.edu/content/about-collection-personal-statement and https://persuasivemaps.library.cornell.edu/content/feedback-and-contact - Source:
- Cadigan, Robert J. "Land of lore and legend. William Gropper's two-fisted cartograph of American folklore grew out of admiration for a virile people." Holiday Magazine, September 1946, pp. 55-57.
- Cite As:
- P.J. Mode collection of persuasive cartography, #8548. Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections, Cornell University Library.
- Repository:
- Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections, Cornell University Library
- Archival Collection:
- P.J. Mode collection of persuasive cartography
- Format:
- Image
- Rights:
- For important information about copyright and use, see http://persuasivemaps.library.cornell.edu/copyright.