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Herbert Lawrence Block, commonly known as Herblock (October13, 1909October7, 2001), was an American
editorial cartoonist An editorial cartoonist, also known as a political cartoonist, is an artist who draws editorial cartoons that contain some level of political or social commentary. Their cartoons are used to convey and question an aspect of daily news or curren ...
and author best known for his commentaries on national domestic and foreign policy. During the course of a career stretching into nine decades, he won three
Pulitzer Prize The Pulitzer Prize () is an award for achievements in newspaper, magazine, online journalism, literature, and musical composition within the United States. It was established in 1917 by provisions in the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had ma ...
s for editorial cartooning (
1942 Events Below, the events of World War II have the "WWII" prefix. January * January 1 – WWII: The Declaration by United Nations is signed by China, the United Kingdom, the United States, the Soviet Union, and 22 other nations, in ...
,
1954 Events January * January 1 – The Soviet Union ceases to demand war reparations from West Germany. * January 3 – The Italian broadcaster RAI officially begins transmitting. * January 7 – Georgetown-IBM experiment: The fir ...
, and
1979 Events January * January 1 ** United Nations Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim heralds the start of the ''International Year of the Child''. Many musicians donate to the ''Music for UNICEF Concert'' fund, among them ABBA, who write the song ...
), shared a fourth Pulitzer Prize in 1973 for Public Service on Watergate, the
Presidential Medal of Freedom The Presidential Medal of Freedom is the highest civilian award of the United States, along with the Congressional Gold Medal. It is an award bestowed by the president of the United States to recognize people who have made "an especially merito ...
(1994), the
National Cartoonist Society The National Cartoonists Society (NCS) is an organization of professional cartoonists in the United States. It presents the National Cartoonists Society Awards. The Society was born in 1946 when groups of cartoonists got together to entertain the ...
Editorial Cartoon Award in 1957 and 1960, the
Reuben Award The National Cartoonists Society (NCS) is an organization of professional cartoonists in the United States. It presents the National Cartoonists Society Awards. The Society was born in 1946 when groups of cartoonists got together to entertain the ...
in 1956, the Gold Key Award (the National Cartoonists Society Hall of Fame) in 1979, and numerous other honors.


Career

Block was the youngest of three boys born in Chicago to a Catholic mother, Theresa Lupe Block, and a father of Jewish descent, David Julian Block, a chemist and electrical engineer. (His brother Rich became president of an industrial laundry and his brother Bill was a newspaper reporter for the '' Chicago Tribune'' and later for the ''Chicago Sun''.) He began taking classes at the Art Institute of Chicago when he was eleven, and adopted the "Herblock" signature in high school. After graduating in 1927, he attended
Lake Forest College Lake Forest College is a private liberal arts college in Lake Forest, Illinois. Founded in 1857 as Lind University by a group of Presbyterian ministers, the college has been coeducational since 1876 and an undergraduate-focused liberal arts inst ...
for almost two years. Late in his second year there he was hiredafter submitting some cartoons he had done in high school and college for the ''Evanston News-Index''to replace the '' Chicago Daily News'' departing editorial cartoonist. He never returned to school. Block moved to Cleveland in 1933 to become the staff cartoonist for
Newspaper Enterprise Association The Newspaper Enterprise Association (NEA) is an editorial column and comic strip newspaper syndication service based in the United States and established in 1902. The oldest syndicate still in operation, the NEA was originally a secondary news ...
, which distributed his cartoons nationally. He won his first
Pulitzer Prize The Pulitzer Prize () is an award for achievements in newspaper, magazine, online journalism, literature, and musical composition within the United States. It was established in 1917 by provisions in the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had ma ...
in 1942, then spent two years in the Army doing cartoons and press releases. Upon discharge Block became chief editorial cartoonist for ''
The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nat ...
'', where he worked until his death 55 years later. Block's cartoons were syndicated to newspapers around the world by
Creators Syndicate Creators Syndicate (also known as Creators) is an American independent distributor of comic strips and syndicated columns to daily newspapers, websites, and other digital outlets. When founded in 1987, Creators Syndicate became one of the few su ...
from 1987 until his death in 2001. He never married, and, in the ''Posts employee index, his address was listed as simply "''The Washington Post''".


Cartoons

His first cartoon for the ''Chicago Daily News'' (April24, 1929) advocated conservation of America's forests. Herblock said that his family was conservative and that his father voted for
Herbert Hoover Herbert Clark Hoover (August 10, 1874 – October 20, 1964) was an American politician who served as the 31st president of the United States from 1929 to 1933 and a member of the Republican Party, holding office during the onset of the Gre ...
in 1928. But with the onset of the Great Depression, he became a supporter of President
Franklin D. Roosevelt Franklin Delano Roosevelt (; ; January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), often referred to by his initials FDR, was an American politician and attorney who served as the 32nd president of the United States from 1933 until his death in 1945. As th ...
and the
New Deal The New Deal was a series of programs, public work projects, financial reforms, and regulations enacted by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the United States between 1933 and 1939. Major federal programs agencies included the Civilian Cons ...
. He pointed out the dangers of
Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...
aggression, the growing Nazi menace, and opposed American isolationists. While he criticized Stalin and other Communist figures, he also believed that the United States was overreacting to the danger of communism. In the early 1950s, Senator
Joseph McCarthy Joseph Raymond McCarthy (November 14, 1908 – May 2, 1957) was an American politician who served as a Republican U.S. Senator from the state of Wisconsin from 1947 until his death in 1957. Beginning in 1950, McCarthy became the most visi ...
was a recurring target of Herblock's cartoons, one of which introduced the term ''
McCarthyism McCarthyism is the practice of making false or unfounded accusations of subversion and treason, especially when related to anarchism, communism and socialism, and especially when done in a public and attention-grabbing manner. The term orig ...
''. He won a second Pulitzer Prize in 1954. ''The Washington Post'' officially endorsed Eisenhower in the 1952 presidential election. Because Herblock supported Adlai Stevenson, the ''Post'' pulled his cartoons, but restored them after a week. He always insisted on total editorial independence, regardless of whether or not his cartoons agreed with the ''Posts stance on political issues. He focused most of his attacks on those public figures in power, often on Republican figures, but Democrats who displeased him were not immune from criticism. As an example—despite being an ardent admirer of Franklin Roosevelt—he found it necessary to attack the president's 1937
court-packing The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point of ...
scheme. During the 1950s, Herblock criticized Eisenhower mainly for insufficient action on civil rights and for not curbing the abuses of Senator McCarthy. In the following decade, he attacked the US war effort in Vietnam, causing President Johnson to drop his plans of awarding the cartoonist with a Presidential Medal of Freedom. The cartoonist would eventually be awarded this honor by Bill Clinton in 1994. Some of Herblock's finest cartoons were those attacking the
Nixon Administration Richard Nixon's tenure as the 37th president of the United States began with his first inauguration on January 20, 1969, and ended when he resigned on August 9, 1974, in the face of almost certain impeachment because of the Watergate Scanda ...
during the Watergate Scandal, winning him his third Pulitzer Prize in 1979. Nixon canceled his subscription to the ''Post'' after Herblock drew him crawling out of an open sewer in 1954. He had once used the same motif for Senator McCarthy. He also ended up on the president's infamous
enemies list "Nixon's Enemies List" is the informal name of what started as a list of President of the United States Richard Nixon's major political opponents compiled by Charles Colson, written by George T. Bell (assistant to Colson, special counsel to th ...
. In the 1980s and 1990s, he satirized and criticized Presidents Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and Clinton in addition to taking on the issues of the day: Gun control; abortion; the influence of fundamentalist Christian groups on public policy; and the Dot Com bubble. The tobacco industry was a favorite target of Herblock, who had smoked at one time. He gave it up and had criticized cigarette companies even before that. Stating that he never got tired of his work, Herblock continued as the 21st century began by lampooning newly elected president George W. Bush. He died on October7, 2001, after a protracted bout of pneumonia six days short of what would have been his 92nd birthday. His final cartoon appeared in ''The Washington Post'' on August26.


Honors

Herblock won three
Pulitzer Prize The Pulitzer Prize () is an award for achievements in newspaper, magazine, online journalism, literature, and musical composition within the United States. It was established in 1917 by provisions in the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had ma ...
s for editorial cartooning (
1942 Events Below, the events of World War II have the "WWII" prefix. January * January 1 – WWII: The Declaration by United Nations is signed by China, the United Kingdom, the United States, the Soviet Union, and 22 other nations, in ...
,
1954 Events January * January 1 – The Soviet Union ceases to demand war reparations from West Germany. * January 3 – The Italian broadcaster RAI officially begins transmitting. * January 7 – Georgetown-IBM experiment: The fir ...
,
1979 Events January * January 1 ** United Nations Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim heralds the start of the ''International Year of the Child''. Many musicians donate to the ''Music for UNICEF Concert'' fund, among them ABBA, who write the song ...
), shared a fourth Pulitzer Prize in 1973 for Public Service on Watergate, the Presidential Medal of Freedom (1994), the
National Cartoonist Society The National Cartoonists Society (NCS) is an organization of professional cartoonists in the United States. It presents the National Cartoonists Society Awards. The Society was born in 1946 when groups of cartoonists got together to entertain the ...
Editorial Cartoon Award in 1957 and 1960, the
Reuben Award The National Cartoonists Society (NCS) is an organization of professional cartoonists in the United States. It presents the National Cartoonists Society Awards. The Society was born in 1946 when groups of cartoonists got together to entertain the ...
in 1956, and the Gold Key Award (the National Cartoonists Society Hall of Fame) in 1979. In 1986 he received the Elijah Parish Lovejoy Award as well as an honorary
Doctor of Laws A Doctor of Law is a degree in law. The application of the term varies from country to country and includes degrees such as the Doctor of Juridical Science (J.S.D. or S.J.D), Juris Doctor (J.D.), Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), and Legum Doctor (LL. ...
degree from
Colby College Colby College is a private liberal arts college in Waterville, Maine. It was founded in 1813 as the Maine Literary and Theological Institution, then renamed Waterville College after the city where it resides. The donations of Christian philanthro ...
, and in 1999 an honorary Doctor of Arts degree from Harvard University. In 1961, he was chosen as one of 50 outstanding Americans of meritorious performance in the fields of endeavor, to be honored as a Guest of Honor to the first annual Banquet of the Golden Plate in Monterey, California. Honor was awarded by vote of the National Panel of Distinguished Americans of the Academy of Achievement. In 1966, he was selected to design the U.S. postage stamp commemorating the 175th anniversary of the
Bill of Rights A bill of rights, sometimes called a declaration of rights or a charter of rights, is a list of the most important rights to the citizens of a country. The purpose is to protect those rights against infringement from public officials and pri ...
. In 1987 he received the
Four Freedoms Award The Four Freedoms Award is an annual award presented to "those men and women whose achievements have demonstrated a commitment to those principles which US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt proclaimed in his ''Four Freedoms speech'' to the Unit ...
for the Freedom of Speech. In 2008 Herblock's work was the subject of exhibitions entitled ''Herblock's Presidents'' at the
Smithsonian Institution The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums and education and research centers, the largest such complex in the world, created by the U.S. government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". Founded o ...
's
National Portrait Gallery (United States) The National Portrait Gallery is a historic art museum between 7th, 9th, F, and G Streets NW in Washington, D.C., in the United States. Founded in 1962 and opened to the public in 1968, it is part of the Smithsonian Institution. Its collections ...
, and ''Herblock's History'' at the
Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library ...
. In late 2009 and early 2010, the Library of Congress showcased a new exhibition called ''Herblock!''. This exhibition included cartoons that represented Block's ability to wield his pen effectively and artfully. He used it to condemn corruption and expose injustice, inequality, and immorality. His topics included the Great Depression; the rise of fascism and World War II; communism and the Cold War; Senator Joseph McCarthy; race relations; Richard Nixon; the Reagan era; the 2000 election and more. When Herb Block died in October 2001, he left $50 million with instructions to create a foundation to support charitable and educational programs that help promote and sustain the causes he championed during his 72 years of cartooning. The Herb Block Foundation awarded its first grants and the annual
Herblock Prize The Herblock Prize for editorial cartooning is an annual $15,000 after-tax cash prize, and a sterling silver Tiffany trophy.
in editorial cartooning in 2004. According to its website, the Herb Block Foundation "is committed to defending the basic freedoms guaranteed all Americans, combating all forms of discrimination and prejudice and improving the conditions of the poor and underprivileged through the creation or support of charitable and educational programs with the same goals. The Foundation is also committed to improving educational opportunities to deserving students through post-secondary education scholarships and to promoting editorial cartooning through continuing research." On January 27, 2014,
HBO Home Box Office (HBO) is an American pay television, premium television network, which is the flagship property of namesake parent subsidiary Home Box Office, Inc., itself a unit owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. The overall Home Box Office busi ...
premiered a documentary, ''Herblock: The Black & The White'', which was executive produced by George Stevens Jr., produced and directed by his son, Michael Stevens, who also co-wrote with Sara Lukinson. The documentary interviews Jon Stewart, Lewis Black,
Tom Brokaw Thomas John Brokaw (; born February 6, 1940) is an American retired network television journalist and author. He first served as the co-anchor of ''The Today Show'' from 1976 to 1981 with Jane Pauley, then as the anchor and managing editor of '' ...
,
Bob Woodward Robert Upshur Woodward (born March 26, 1943) is an American investigative journalist. He started working for ''The Washington Post'' as a reporter in 1971 and now holds the title of associate editor. While a young reporter for ''The Washingt ...
,
Carl Bernstein Carl Milton Bernstein ( ; born February 14, 1944) is an American investigative journalist and author. While a young reporter for ''The Washington Post'' in 1972, Bernstein was teamed up with Bob Woodward, and the two did much of the original new ...
,
Jules Feiffer Jules Ralph Feiffer (born January 26, 1929)'' Comics Buyer's Guide'' #1650; February 2009; Page 107 is an American cartoonist and author, who was considered the most widely read satirist in the country. He won the Pulitzer Prize in 1986 as North ...
,
Ted Koppel Edward James Martin Koppel (born February 8, 1940) is a British-born American broadcast journalist, best known as the anchor for ''Nightline'', from the program's inception in 1980 until 2005. Before ''Nightline'', he spent 20 years as a broadc ...
and Ben Bradlee as witnesses to Block's life, work and indelible contribution to American satire.


Books of collected cartoons by Herbert Block

*Block, Herbert. ''Herblock: The Life and Works of the Great Political Cartoonist'' ed. by Harry Katz (W. W. Norton, 2009), 304pp; prints more than two hundred fifty cartoons in the text; comes with a DVD containing more than 18,000 Herblock cartoons *''Herblock's history: political cartoons from the crash to the millennium.'' Library of Congress, 2000. *''Herblock: a cartoonist's life.'' Maxwell Macmillan International, 1993. *''Herblock at large: "Let's go back a little ..." and other cartoons with commentary'' Pantheon Books, 1987. *''Herblock through the looking glass'' Norton, 1984. *''Herblock on all fronts: text and cartoons'' New American Library, 1980 *''Herblock special report'' Norton, 1974 *''Herblock's state of the Union.'' Simon & Schuster, (1972) *''The Herblock gallery.'' Simon & Schuster, (1968) *''Straight Herblock. '' Simon & Schuster (1964) *''Herblock's special for today.'' Simon & Schuster, (1958). *''Herblock's here and now.'' Simon & Schuster, (1955). *''The Herblock book'' (1952) *''Herblock looks at Communism'' 950?


References


Further reading

* Appleford, Simon. "Revealing Political Bias: A Macroanalysis of 8,480 Herblock Cartoons." ''Current Research in Digital History'' 1 (2018)
online
* Harvey, Robert C. "Herblock" in ''American National Biography Online April 2004 Update'

* Heitzmann, William Ray. "The political cartoon as a teaching device." ''Teaching Political Science'' 6.2 (1979): 166-184. https://doi.org/10.1080/00922013.1979.11000158 *Johnson, Haynes, and Harry Katz
"Herblock: The Life And Work Of The Great Political Cartoonist"
(2009) * Lamb, Chris. "Herblock's History" ''Journal of American History'' 100#3 (2013) Pp. 946–947
online
* McCarthy, Michael P. "Political Cartoons in the History Classroom." ''History Teacher'' 11.1 (1977): 29-38
online
* Medhurst, Martin J., and Michael A. DeSousa. "Political cartoons as rhetorical form: A taxonomy of graphic discourse." ''Communications Monographs'' 48.3 (1981): 197-236.


External links

*Many of Herblock's works can be found at the Library of Congress.

(online exhibition from the Library of Congress) *
The Herb Block Foundation
''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
''
Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum Art Database
{{Authority control 1909 births 2001 deaths American editorial cartoonists American caricaturists Jewish caricaturists Lake Forest College alumni Presidential Medal of Freedom recipients Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Cartooning winners Reuben Award winners School of the Art Institute of Chicago alumni The Washington Post people Recipients of the Four Freedoms Award