Benjamin Franklin: “Join, Or Die” Cartoon
The Images, Cartoons, and Other Visual Sources That Shaped America
Table of Contents
Benjamin Franklin: “Join, Or Die” Cartoon
Overview
About the Artist
Document Image
Context
Explanation and Analysis of theDocument
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Abstract
The “Join, or Die” illustration was one of the first images used to promote unity among the thirteen colonies that would become the United States. The cartoon accompanied a May 1754 essay by Benjamin Franklin in the Pennsylvania Gazette, Franklin’s newspaper. At the time, fighting had broken out between the British and French colonists in North America in what would become the French and Indian War (1754–63). This was one theater in a global war, the Seven Years’ War (1756–63), between Britain and its allies and a French-led coalition. The image depicts a snake that has been cut into pieces, presumably by the French and their allies, and each segment of the serpent is labeled as a different colony.
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