Cartoon, SALOON KEEPERS' TROUBLES, satirizing the beseiged profession and the increasing threats to its longevity, 1908. Joseph Bruckner, New York. Light stain and crease in bottom margin.
Depicts a perplexed-looking saloonkeeper accosted by a police officer, a preacher, a man representing the "Law and Order League", and a woman representing the "Temperance Union", while bums dine at a counter below a sign reading, FREE LUNCH. The cash register says, NO SALE.
Public drinking establishments were increasingly coming under attack from social reformers in the early 20th century, as temperance mania swept the country and "law and order" were the watchwords of the day. The first example of this cartoon we have encountered, it no doubt hung on the wall of a saloon in the days before Prohibition.
