Did Comic Books Help Elect Herbert Hoover and Harry Truman?

In 1928, the New York State Herbert Hoover for President committee was having difficulty enticing newspapers to print biographical sketches of their candidate. As a result, the campaign came up with the novel idea of creating a 72-panel comic strip that not only became popular in newspapers but as a collected campaign booklet as well. Twenty years later, the Democratic National Committee commissioned a comic book based on the life of President Harry S, Truman and distributed three million copies in key battleground states. Distribution in California was especially heavy, a state that Truman won by a mere 17,865 votes.

Did these innovative approaches – officially authorized by both the Hoover campaign and Democratic National Committee – have an impact on the 1928 and 1948 presidential elections? Few, if any, historians have ever considered the question, or even acknowledged the existence of these “comic books” in published dissertations or academic journals. While the answer is impossible to definitively establish, this poster presentation will explore their potential influence nonetheless.

Visually, the poster will include images of the two comic books cited above accompanied by an exploration of their conception and discussion of their impact on voters. Although newspaper articles from the respective time periods will be cited, the views of the two men most responsible for the creation of these comic books will be the primary focus: Edward Anthony of the Hoover campaign and Jack Redding of the Democratic National Committee, both of whom later published memoirs that contain sections on both “Picture Life of a Great American” (Herbert Hoover) and “The Story of Harry S. Truman.”

Analyzing the impact of comic books on presidential elections during the first half of the twentieth century offers cultural insights and contextualizes the role of comic books in American society that goes beyond entertainment. Furthermore, this poster presentation hopes to both resurrect “Picture Life of a Great American” and “The Story of Harry S. Truman” from obscurity and legitimize their role in the 1928 and 1948 elections.