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James Akin ( 1773 1846) was an American political cartoonist and engraver from 
Image:1802 Columbia SouthCarolina byJamesAkin Winterthur.png, Illustration by Akin published in John Drayton's ''A View of South Carolina,'' 1802 (Winterthur Museum)
Image:Cock ca1804 attrib to JamesAkin AmericanAntiquarianSociety.png, Caricature of
James Akin Collection
at the William L. Clements Library {{DEFAULTSORT:Akin, James 1770s births 1846 deaths 19th-century American artists 19th-century American journalists 19th-century American male writers American caricaturists American editorial cartoonists American engravers American male journalists Artists from Charleston, South Carolina People from Newburyport, Massachusetts Writers from Charleston, South Carolina Writers from Philadelphia Year of birth uncertain
South Carolina
South Carolina ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders North Carolina to the north and northeast, the Atlantic Ocean to the southeast, and Georgia (U.S. state), Georg ...
. He worked in Philadelphia
Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...
and Newburyport, Massachusetts
Newburyport is a coastal city in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States, northeast of Boston. The population was 18,289 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. A historic seaport with a vibrant tourism industry, Newburyport includes p ...
. Associates included President William Henry Harrison
William Henry Harrison (February 9, 1773April 4, 1841) was the ninth president of the United States, serving from March 4 to April 4, 1841, the shortest presidency in U.S. history. He was also the first U.S. president to die in office, causin ...
and Jacob Perkins. His works are held at the American Antiquarian Society
The American Antiquarian Society (AAS), located in Worcester, Massachusetts, is both a learned society and a national research library of pre-twentieth-century American history and culture. Founded in 1812, it is the oldest historical society in ...
, Library of Congress
The Library of Congress (LOC) is a research library in Washington, D.C., serving as the library and research service for the United States Congress and the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It also administers Copyright law o ...
, U.S. National Portrait Gallery, and Winterthur Museum.Maureen O'Brien Quimby. The Political Art of James Akin. Winterthur Portfolio, Vol. 7 (1972), pp. 59–112
Skillet incident
In the early 1800s, Akin worked as an engraver for Edmund March Blunt in Newburyport. "In late October 1804 the two men argued publicly, and in the course of the disagreement Blunt threw an iron skillet at Akin, hitting an unfortunate passerby. Akin, uninjured, retaliated with a deragotory print of Blunt entitled 'Infuriated Despondency' and a verse he called 'A Skillet Song.'" The caricature was later featured in the '' Newburyport Herald'' in 1805 and in pottery throughout London andLiverpool
Liverpool is a port City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. It is situated on the eastern side of the River Mersey, Mersey Estuary, near the Irish Sea, north-west of London. With a population ...
in 2006, heaping scorn upon Blunt and his descendants. A few examples still exist.
Images
Examples of Akin's work:Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson (, 1743July 4, 1826) was an American Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the third president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. He was the primary author of the United States Declaration of Indepe ...
and Sally Hemings
Sarah "Sally" Hemings ( 1773 – 1835) was a Black people, black woman Slavery in the United States, enslaved to the third President of the United States Thomas Jefferson, inherited among many others from his father-in-law, John Wayles.
Hemi ...
, ca.1804, attributed to Akin (American Antiquarian Society)
Image:1805 InfuriatedDespondency byJamesAkin NewburyportMA WorcesterArtMuseum.png, "Infuriated Despondency," 1805; satirical portrait of Edmund M. Blunt wielding footed skillet (Worcester Art Museum)
Image:1824 Caucus curs by JamesAkin LC 00005v.jpg, "Caucus curs in full yell," 1824; critique of "the press's treatment of Andrew Jackson
Andrew Jackson (March 15, 1767 – June 8, 1845) was the seventh president of the United States from 1829 to 1837. Before Presidency of Andrew Jackson, his presidency, he rose to fame as a general in the U.S. Army and served in both houses ...
, and on the practice of nominating candidates by caucus during the presidential race of 1824" (Library of Congress)
Image:1830 sabbatarians byJamesAkin Philadelphia AmericanAntiquarianSociety.png, 1830 caricature of American Christian Sabbatarians, whose "goal was to prevent the federal government from desecrating the Sabbath by requiring that the mails be transported and the post offices open to the public seven days a week" (American Antiquarian Society)Richard R. John. Taking Sabbatarianism Seriously: The Postal System, the Sabbath, and the Transformation of American Political Culture. Journal of the Early Republic, Vol. 10, No. 4 (Winter 1990)
Further reading
* Nina Fletcher Little. "The Cartoons of James Akin upon Liverpool Ware." Old-Time New England, (January 1938) * Lewis C. Rubenstein. "James Akin in Newburyport." Essex Institute Historical Collections (1966) *References
External links
*James Akin Collection
at the William L. Clements Library {{DEFAULTSORT:Akin, James 1770s births 1846 deaths 19th-century American artists 19th-century American journalists 19th-century American male writers American caricaturists American editorial cartoonists American engravers American male journalists Artists from Charleston, South Carolina People from Newburyport, Massachusetts Writers from Charleston, South Carolina Writers from Philadelphia Year of birth uncertain