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Speaker 1: This Day in History Class is a production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 1: Hello and welcome to This Day in History Class, a

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Speaker 1: show that decodes history one day at a time. I'm

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Speaker 1: Gabe Lucier, and today we're looking at the story behind

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Speaker 1: one of the most famous political cartoons in history and

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Speaker 1: how it became an enduring symbol of American unity. The

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Speaker 1: day was May ninth, seventeen fifty four. Benjamin Franklin published

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Speaker 1: the famous Join or Die political cartoon. The woodcut illustration

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Speaker 1: depicted a snake severed into eight pieces, each of which

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Speaker 1: was labeled with the initials of a different British colony

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Speaker 1: in America. Franklin intended the cartoon, or emblem, as he

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Speaker 1: called it, to be a warning to his fellow colonists,

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Speaker 1: As the caption suggested, they could either join together to

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Speaker 1: combat the growing threat posed by the French and their

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Speaker 1: native American allies, or die divided. The cartoon first appeared

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Speaker 1: in the Pennsylvania Gazette, the most widely read newspaper in

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Speaker 1: the colonies, in a pet project of Benjamin Franklin. It

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Speaker 1: was featured alongside an editorial penned by Franklin, in which

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Speaker 1: he lamented the present disunited state of the British colonies

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Speaker 1: for the first time in history. Franklin suggested that the

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Speaker 1: separate colonial governments should ban together to defend against the

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Speaker 1: French in the impending French and Indian War. The Joiner

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Speaker 1: Die cartoon echoed that idea, visually ensuring that the message

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Speaker 1: was accessible even to the colony's illiterate majority. The appearance

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Speaker 1: of the cartoon was notable in that it was the

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Speaker 1: first political cartoon ever published in an American newspaper. However,

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Speaker 1: it wasn't the first to be published in the colonies

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Speaker 1: in general. That honor belongs to another woodcut illustration published

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Speaker 1: by Benjamin Franklin. It was titled Non Votis et cetera,

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Speaker 1: and it was featured in his seventeen forty seven pamphlet

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Speaker 1: Plain Truth. It's worth noting, however, that the image was

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Speaker 1: not created specifically for that pamphlet. It was actually reused

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Speaker 1: from an earlier publication of Aesop's Fables. So while it

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Speaker 1: certainly functions as a political cartoon in the context of

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Speaker 1: the pamphlet, it wasn't originally designed for that purpose, and

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Speaker 1: in that light, maybe Join or Die should be thought

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Speaker 1: of as the true American original. One thing we can

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Speaker 1: say for certain is that Franklin understood the interplay between

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Speaker 1: words and pictures better than most. Throughout his life, he

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Speaker 1: would turn to cartoons again and again as a way

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Speaker 1: to elucidate ideas, underscore an argument, or elicit an emotional response.

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Speaker 1: But although he was adept at wielding the power of

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Speaker 1: the cartoon, he wasn't himself a cartoonist. As far as

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Speaker 1: we know, Franklin was probably too busy with his political

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Speaker 1: career to devote time to wood cutting, especially since he

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Speaker 1: wasn't trained as an engraver. It's far more likely that

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Speaker 1: he employed someone to create illustrations for his book publications

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Speaker 1: and later for his newspaper, But whoever that artist was,

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Speaker 1: their name has since been lost to history. As for

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Speaker 1: the concept behind the Join or Die cartoon, we don't

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Speaker 1: know who's responsible for that. Either it may have been

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Speaker 1: the person who drafted the image, or it may have

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Speaker 1: been Franklin himself, since it was published alongside an essay

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Speaker 1: he wrote. In either case, the idea was likely inspired

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Speaker 1: by a book illustration published in France in sixteen eighty five.

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Speaker 1: It showed a snake divided in two, with the caption

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Speaker 1: join or die. Both images may have also drawn upon

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Speaker 1: folklore of the era, namely the popular belief that a

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Speaker 1: snake cut into pieces could be brought back to life

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Speaker 1: if its parts were rejoined before sunset. The superstition itself

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Speaker 1: was likely based on the snake's ability to shed its skin,

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Speaker 1: which had prompted many people to associate snakes with regeneration

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Speaker 1: and renewal. That also helps explain why the snake, an

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Speaker 1: animal typically associated with deception and danger, would be embraced

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Speaker 1: as a symbol of one's own land. Design of the

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Speaker 1: join or die snake may hold a deeper meaning as well.

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Speaker 1: It's been suggested that the snake is meant to evoke

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Speaker 1: a map, with the shapes of the pieces representing the

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Speaker 1: curves and coastlines of the different colonies. This theory is

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Speaker 1: further strengthened by the arrangement of the pieces, which places

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Speaker 1: the colonies in their geographic order, with the New England

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Speaker 1: colonies at the head of the snake and South Carolina

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Speaker 1: at its tail. By now you might be curious why

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Speaker 1: the snake was only cut into eight pieces rather than

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Speaker 1: thirteen to match the number of colonies. For whatever reason,

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Speaker 1: the artists grouped the four colonies of New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut,

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Speaker 1: and Rhode Island into a single piece labeled ne for

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Speaker 1: New England. This may have been done to emphasize the

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Speaker 1: idea of unity, suggesting that the New England colonies were

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Speaker 1: already more in sync than their neighbors to the south.

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Speaker 1: The seven colonies of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia,

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Speaker 1: North Carolina, and South Carolina were each afforded their own

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Speaker 1: piece in the drawing, while Delaware and Georgia were excluded altogether.

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Speaker 1: In Delaware's case, it was likely omitted because it shared

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Speaker 1: a governor with Pennsylvania and was thus already represented, and

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Speaker 1: as for Georgia, it was probably just considered too new

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Speaker 1: a colony to be of much use in the imminent

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Speaker 1: war against the French. Franklin published Join or Die in

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Speaker 1: the lead up to the Albany Congress. A meeting called

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Speaker 1: that June to discuss how colonial leaders should respond to

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Speaker 1: the growing threat of the French military and its native allies. Franklin,

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Speaker 1: who attended the meeting, reiterated the point of his article,

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Speaker 1: the need for the colonies to form a strong alliance.

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Speaker 1: He proposed a unified colonial government to that end, one

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Speaker 1: that could levy taxes and organize a military. It would

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Speaker 1: be governed by a council of representatives appointed by each

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Speaker 1: of the colonies and overseen by a President General to

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Speaker 1: be appointed by the British Crown. The Congress ultimately approved

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Speaker 1: Franklin's plan, but the British government did not. Parliament worried

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Speaker 1: that a unified government in America would undercut England's control,

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Speaker 1: that with a formal military at their disposal, the colonists

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Speaker 1: might even stage a rebellion. Hoping to nip that outcome

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Speaker 1: in the bud, the British sent their own army to

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Speaker 1: defend the colonies during the French and Indian War. Franklin's

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Speaker 1: push for unification may have failed, but the image he

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Speaker 1: had used in support of it lived on. About a

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Speaker 1: decade later, during the build up to the American Revolution,

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Speaker 1: the Joiner Die Snake resurfaced in colonial newspapers. Once again,

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Speaker 1: the cartoon was used to call for organized action among

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Speaker 1: the colonies, but this time the threat they united to

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Speaker 1: oppose was the unjust rule of their own parent country.

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Speaker 1: Different versions of the snake cartoon appeared in newspapers throughout

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Speaker 1: the Revolutionary War, sometimes as part of the masthead. It

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Speaker 1: was then repurposed again during the American Civil War, both

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Speaker 1: by the Union and by the Confederacy. In the year

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Speaker 1: since then, most Americans have adopted the bald eagle as

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Speaker 1: their national animal representative of choice. And while Ben Franklin

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Speaker 1: would have certainly considered that a downgrade from the snake,

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Speaker 1: he's also the guy who famously preferred the turkey, So

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Speaker 1: take that as you will. I'm gay, Blues Yay, and

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Speaker 1: hopefully you now know a little more about history today

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Speaker 1: than you did yesterday. If you'd like to keep up

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Speaker 1: with the show, you can follow us on Twitter, Facebook,

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Speaker 1: and Instagram at TDI HC Show, and if you have

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Speaker 1: any comments or suggestions, feel free to send them my

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Speaker 1: way by writing to This Day at iHeartMedia dot com.

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Speaker 1: Thanks to Kasby Bias for producing the show, and thanks

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Speaker 1: to you for listening. I'll see you back here again

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Speaker 1: tomorrow for another day in History class in