http://i60.photobucket.com/albums/h8/S22904945/Myalbum/goldfish_zps55992b4d.jpg
1960: Indecisive Customer
George doesn’t have a range of tricks at his disposal. If she hasn’t decided yet perhaps she isn’t going to.
http://i60.photobucket.com/albums/h8/S22904945/Myalbum/GetWell_zps4aeb8d39.jpg
1960: Retail Therapy
The shopping spree has clearly cheered her up but it hasn’t done anything to aid his recovery.
http://i60.photobucket.com/albums/h8/S22904945/Myalbum/united_zpsc5c43a55.jpg
1960: No Attempt at Impartiality Here
This artist has not disguised his sympathies. The Labour team are shown as a shambles. Gaitskell and Wilson are squabbling. Behind I can definitely make out Michael Foot. The fat one is Ian Mikardo. Their supporters are just as bad. They’re rowdy and fighting with each other.
By contrast the Conservative team are shown as disciplined and loyal. There is apparently not a rebellious thought among them. The supporters are shown as totally well behaved. The policeman who has been the job of watching them has a cushy job unlike his colleague who is trying to make the Labour supporters behave themselves.
Yet by 1963 MacMillan was beset by crises and had to resign. In 1964 Wilson easily defeated Sir Alec Douglas-Home giving rise to the Private Eye joke where Home looks the election results and says ‘A well, its back to the drawing room.’
Is that Denis Healey tucked in next to Michael Foot?
I don’t think so. I feel pretty sure that it is Ian Mikardo.
http://i60.photobucket.com/albums/h8/S22904945/Myalbum/yesterday_zpsdb26ba13.jpg
1960: A Surreal Message
This makes a change from the usual kind of sensational placard. No warning is being issued here. What are people supposed to do when they see this poster?
http://i60.photobucket.com/albums/h8/S22904945/Myalbum/suitable_zps5d014dff.jpg
1960: Another Tramp Joke
In earlier decades we looked at quite a few cartoons in which tramps appeared. In 1960 this is a lonely survivor of this genre.
The lady of the house is offering on of her husband’s old business suits and it would indeed not be suitable for the ‘gentleman of the road’ as he travels around the country. It is just my theory but I wonder if this cartoon is harping back to a time before the Welfare State
http://i60.photobucket.com/albums/h8/S22904945/Myalbum/trafalgar_zps2013d766.jpg
1960: Previously Booked
The two opposing groups are carefully differentiated. On the left we see proletarian Teddy Boys with Winkle Pickers. (The boys’ haircuts were called Tony Curtis, I think?) On the right there are middle class intellectuals with duffle coats, pipes and sensible footwear. The CND leader is growing the beginning of a beard.
http://i60.photobucket.com/albums/h8/S22904945/Myalbum/retire_zps00b24b0f.jpg
1960: Guy Fawkes Night
His father hasn’t bothered to read the instructions. The boy has read them but isn’t able to recognise the danger.
http://i60.photobucket.com/albums/h8/S22904945/Myalbum/thankful_zpsdce5b788.jpg
1960: Desert Island Fantasy
The castaways are indeed very fortunate. I suppose that this cartoon is an ironic riposte to the majority of desert island scenarios.
http://i60.photobucket.com/albums/h8/S22904945/Myalbum/fine_zps41ee74a1.jpg
1960: Instant Cure
Did he just pretend to be ill? It really doesn’t matter as far as this joke is concerned.
I’m still wondering about all these men wearing hats. Football fans are not, and never were, noted for their poshness. Nevertheless a good proportion of those here present are wearing hats. Of course, I never watched any football matches at the time so I can’t speak from personal observation. But my gut feeling persists that men weren’t normally wearing hats any more at the time. (In the army, of course, it was mandatory.)
Certainly caps were worn at matches in the fifties, but by the sixties had more or less disappeared on the terraces.
http://i60.photobucket.com/albums/h8/S22904945/Myalbum/brand_zpscb1a3336.jpg
1960: Middle Class Values in the Underworld
The joke here is that the villains who nick the fags are not ever interested in ‘best practice.’
http://i60.photobucket.com/albums/h8/S22904945/Myalbum/eyes_zps6c7b0945.jpg
1960: Talking the Talk
He is bringing the language of romantic fiction into real life. On the other hand, I think of the people working in such places as being rather hard-bitten and utterly prosaic.
I’ll try those romantic words on my wife!
http://i60.photobucket.com/albums/h8/S22904945/Myalbum/chairmen_zpse6fa0505.jpg
1760: Bringing Modern Concepts into the Eighteenth Century
Modern garage services don’t translate easily into this example of personal transport in the past. In reality it would have been the passenger who got a service.
http://i60.photobucket.com/albums/h8/S22904945/Myalbum/Hermes_zpsfffdaa20.jpg
1960: Classical Allusions
This cartoon is a fairly rare example in 1960 of those which assume that the readers of Punch are educated in the Classics. In earlier decades his was a quite frequent theme. By 1960 the editor would have been taking a chance. He probably assumed that those who didn’t know would not want to proclaim their ignorance.
Anyway…
The guy with wings on his feet is the Ancient Greek god Hermes later identified with the Roman Mercury. He was cunning and fleet of foot. He moved freely between the world of the gods and the world of the mortals. The lady in the drawing had good cause to be suspicious
http://i60.photobucket.com/albums/h8/S22904945/Myalbum/leave_zpsdb34f60a.jpg
1960: Inappropriate…
The past is another country. They do things differently there.
Did the cartoonist really intend us to assume that the lady in question has been physically propelled out of the house? To think that would imply that domestic violence was considered a proper theme for a joke.
We note that the lady in question has already got on her hat and coat and is holding a packed suitcase. So she was leaving anyway. On balance I think it is just a metaphor for the husband saying ‘Good Riddance’ or words to that effect.
Even so, this sort of ‘joke’ is no longer acceptable in polite society.
http://i60.photobucket.com/albums/h8/S22904945/Myalbum/taste_zps58abdc7d.jpg
1960: Another Unlikely Scenario
In the Middle Ages the food taster knew what would happen if he ate all the king’s food…
http://i60.photobucket.com/albums/h8/S22904945/Myalbum/eloping_zps8cc686e3.jpg
1960: Don’t Go Away
The girl’s father is anxious that the young man doesn’t change his mind about eloping with his daughter. The irony of the situation won’t have been lost on the readers of Punch.