Life in Philadelphia was a series of satirical cartoons drawn and engraved by Edward Williams Clay between 1828 and 1830. He modeled them after the British series Life in London (1821), by George and Robert Cruikshank. The Cruikshank cartoons had mocked supposed class differences; Clay's cartoons mocked supposed racial differences.Jenna B. Gibbs, Performing in the Temple of Liberty: Slavery, Theater, and Popular Culture (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014), pp. 134-139, 145.
The cartoons were highly popular, and were copied by artists in New York and London. Life in Philadelphia perpetuated a racist stereotype of hyper-elegant blacks, that became a standard trope of minstrel shows in the mid- to late-nineteenth century.
Background
Edward Williams Clay was a Philadelphia lawyer and fashion illustrator, who became the most prolific political cartoonist of the Jacksonian Era.Edward Williams Clay, Historical Society of Pennsylvania. Retrieved 6 October 2021.
The first edition of Life in Philadelphia was published by William Simpson and Susan Hart in Philadelphia, and consisted of fourteen cartoons. Simpson published the first eleven in 1828 and 1829, and Hart the last three in 1829 and 1830. The engraved images were small, about by , and printed on by sheets. Hart reprinted the entire 14-cartoon series as color aquatints in 1830. She also published other Clay cartoons, that later were added to the London editions of Life in Philadelphia.
Four cartoons in the original series depicted only whites and nine depicted only blacks. They interacted only in Plate 11, depicting a middle-aged black woman inquiring of a young white French shopkeeper about purchasing "flesh coloured silk stockings." Clay's lampoons of white Philadelphians were gentle, and depicted a promenade in the park, a costume ball, an awkward courtship between staid Quakers, and an absurdly dressed woman being mistaken for a prostitute. Clay's lampoons of black Philadelphians were more biting, and ridiculed the supposed fancy dress, pretentious manners, snobbery, and malaprop-filled "black speech" of the city's small but visible black middle class.Kenneth Finkel, Philadelphia ReVisions: The Print Department Collects (Library Company of Philadelphia, 1983), p. 22. "The cartoons were so popular that the term Life in Philadelphia became a standard phrase to refer to fashions, trends, and—most especially—black Philadelphians' social practices and sartorial choices."
Clay's cartoons were indicative of both the white supremacy and class insecurity of the Jacksonian Era, a time when abolitionism and free blacks were perceived as threats to both American slaveholders and the white working class.
Although no complete copy of the first edition of Life in Philadelphia is known to exist, the Library Company of Philadelphia holds examples of all fourteen cartoons, ten of them from the first edition.
London editions Harrison Isaacs published the first London edition of Life in Philadelphia, 1831. He hired artist William Summers to redraw Clay's cartoons, enlarging the images by about 50%. Summers improved them by adding depth and detail, and by placing each within a rectangular border. Eleven cartoons from the original series were redrawn and enlarged, two of them depicting only whites, and Isaacs expanded the series with Summers's own cartoons, depicting only blacks. The cartoons were engraved by Summers and Charles Hunt; and printed by Isaacs, and later by Gabriel Shear Tregear and others. "While the successful transfer of Clay's cartoons was attributable in part to the shared cultural backgrounds and common understandings of London and Philadelphia, the London cartoons took on a new meaning and form. London artists like Isaacs, Summers, Hunt, and Tregear made changes that signposted shifts in the cartoons' meanings, exaggerated the features of Philadelphian blacks even more grotesquely than had Clay, rendering them more bestial in anatomy and features."
Isaacs later removed the two cartoons depicting only whites from the series, and replaced them with other Clay cartoons depicting blacks. A cartoon depicting African Americans celebrating the 1808 end of the Slave Trade was added to coincide with the 1833 abolition of slavery in the British colonies. This was credited as: "Drawn & Eng'd by I. Harris," but scholars now attribute it to Clay. By the end of 1833, all twenty cartoons in the London edition depicted African Americans.Nancy Reynolds Davison, E. W. Clay: American Political Caricaturist of the Jacksonian Era (PhD. diss., University of Michigan, 1980), pp. 85-100.
The twenty African-American cartoons were reprinted in 1834, in Tregear's Black Jokes: being a Series of Laughable Caricatures on the March of Manners Amongst the Blacks.Jasmine Nichole Cobb, Remaking Black Visuality in the Early Nineteenth Century (New York University Press, 2015), p. 198. The twenty cartoons were reprinted in 1860, by publishers T. C. Lewis & Co., London.
The Library Company of Philadelphia holds a large collection of Life in Philadelphia cartoons, from both the Philadelphia and London editions.
Original series Plate Image ArtistPublisher Year Captions Notes1Edward W. ClayWilliam Simpson,Philadelphia1828"Promenade in Washington Square."Not part of the London editions2Edward W. ClayWilliam Simpson,Philadelphia1828"Behold, thou art fair Deborah, thou hast doves eyes. Behold thou art fair Deborah, yea pleasant!""Turn away thine eyes from me, Timothy, for they overcome me; thy hair is as a flock of goats that appear from Gilhead!"Redrawn as Isaacs-113Edward W. ClayWilliam Simpson,Philadelphia1828"Is Miss Dinah at home?""Yes sir but she bery petickly engaged in washing de dishes.""Ah! I'm sorry I cant have the honour to pay my devours to her. Give her my card."Redrawn as Tregear-174Edward W. ClayWilliam Simpson,Philadelphia1828"How you find yourself dis hot weader Miss Chloe?""Pretty well I tank you Mr. Cesar only I aspire too much!"Redrawn as Tregear-85Edward W. ClayWilliam Simpson,Philadelphia1828"Shall I hab de honour to dance de next Quadrille wid you, Miss Minta?""Tank you Mr. Cato,—wid much pleasure, only I'm engaged for de nine next set!"Redrawn as Tregear-166Edward W. ClayWilliam Simpson,Philadelphia1828"Well brudder what 'fect you tink Morgan's deduction gwang to hab on our siety of free masons?"" 'Pon honour I tink he look rader black, 'fraid we lose de 'lection in New York!"Not part of the London editions7Edward W. ClayWilliam Simpson,Philadelphia1828"Hurrah! Hurrah for General Jackson!!""What de debil you hurrah for General Jackson for?—you black Nigger!—I'll larn you better.—I'm a 'ministration Man!!"Redrawn as Tregear-158Edward W. ClayWilliam Simpson,Philadelphia1828"Good evening Miss, shall I have the pleasure of walking with you?""Me sir!! for whom do you take me, sir?""Come, come that's a good one!—for whom do I take you? Why for myself, to be sure!"Redrawn as Isaacs-89Edward W. ClayWilliam Simpson,Philadelphia1829"How you like de new fashion shirt, Miss Florinda?""I tink dey mighty eligum—I see you on new year day when you carry de colour on de Abolition 'siety—you look just like Pluto de God of War!"Redrawn as Tregear-1810Edward W. ClayWilliam Simpson,Philadelphia1829"Fancy Ball"Not part of the London editions11Edward W. ClayWilliam Simpson,Philadelphia1829"Have you any flesh coloured silk stockings, young man?""Oui Madame! here is von pair of de first qualité!"Redrawn as Tregear-9 with image reversed12Edward W. Clay Susan Hart & Son,Philadelphia1829"Take away, take away dose rosy lips,Rich, rich in balmy treasure!—Turn away, turn away dose eyes ob lub,Less I die wid pleasure!!!""Dat is bery fine, Mr. Mortimer,—you sing quite con a moor, as de Italians say!!"Redrawn as Tregear-1913Edward W. ClaySusan Hart & Son,Philadelphia1829"How you like de Waltz, Mr. Lorenzo?"" 'Pon de honour ob a gentleman I tink it vastly indelicate,—Only fit for decommon people!!"Redrawn as Tregear-2014Edward W. ClaySusan Hart,Philadelphia1830"What you tink of my new poke bonnet, Frederick Augustus?""I don't like him no how, 'case dey hide you lubly face, so you can't tell one she nigger from anoder."Redrawn as Tregear-14
London editions NOTES Unshaded Cartoons Printed in the 1831 first London edition of Life in Philadelphia by publisher Harrison Isaacs. Blue-shaded CartoonsAdded to subsequent London editions by Isaacs. Orange-shaded Cartoons Added to publisher G. S. Tregear's 1833 reprinting of Life in Philadelphia. Plate Numbers Tregear's plate numbers are used for the first 20 cartoons, because his numbers remained constant.Isaacs's plate numbers changed, as he added and removed cartoons from the series.