The attached gag cartoon concerns itself with another kind of American Expeditionary Force, different from the one that had recently vacated France: the middle class tourists. With the post-war boom, the U.S. had introduced a new kind of tourist that the world had never seen before and they must have been a site to behold.
There is another article on this site (click here) that states a popular belief held by the Europeans of 1919 that American men were all clean shaven, tended to sport gold teeth, and were most easily recognized by their “big tortoise shell glasses” (a strikingly accurate description of this site’s editor!); however, this is the first visual manifestation of this caricature that we could find. This “Punch” cartoonist did not simply believe that this was a fitting description of the white guys, but black guys, too -and the white women as well; an entire nation resembling Harold Lloyd.
Click here to read about Punch Magazine.
