The magazine, 16 pages with a colour centrefold, was founded in 1876 by Joseph Keppler, an Austrian immigrant, and lasted until 1918. An English edition was published from January 1889 to June 1890.

Among those you'll find represented in these screens are Fred Opper, J.S.Pughe, James Wales, Bernhard Gillam, Frank Nankivell, Rose O'Neill and Eugene Zimmerman.

Above all there was Joseph Keppler (1838-1894) who set the tone and scale of the gatefold images. He was active in his homeland as a cartoonist, but, to pay the bills, he was a scene painter and stage comedian. His father left Europe for a small general store in Missouri. In 1872 Joseph moved to New York and worked for 'Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper'.

It becamee clear that humour magazines in the English language were an income generating proposition. The combination of Keppler and Frederick Burr Opper (187-1937) assured that the visual language of the European cartoonist flourished in America. Opper also invented the 'Happy Hooligan' for Hearst and "Her name was Maud" a mule that topped the page of Happy Hooligan strips.

The availability of the work on Wikimedia Commons allows a rounded appreciation of the visual language developed towards the end of the 19th century when treating Wall Street, the Trusts, malign foreign powers and domestic tensions.

for images of Uncle Sam, J.P.Morgan, FDR, and Teddy Roosevelt