The last time I brought an unknown (to me) New Yorker cartoonist to this site, he was identified as Alfred Leete, whose cartoon appeared in the very first issue of The New Yorker.
The case of today’s mystery New Yorker cartoonist came about from my looking through the third anniversary issue of The New Yorker, dated February 25, 1928. After pausing on page 24 to admire a half-page Peter Arno cartoon I looked over to page 25 where my eyes rested on the above cartoon. I looked at the signature, “P. Panurge” — hmmm, the name wasn’t at all familiar. It might not even be “Panurge” (See below for a closer look at the signature). Checked Ink Spill‘s “New Yorker Cartoonists A – Z” (I sometimes forget I’ve already researched the more obscure cartoonists) , checked the New Yorker‘s database, checked the issue’s database table of contents (the drawing is attributed to I. Klein. Mr. Klein is in the issue, on page 17). Googled “Panurge” and “P. Panurge” and came up with nothing related to cartoons or a cartoonist. I looked through a few issues surrounding the 1928 issue hoping there’d be another Panurge cartoon. Coming up empty, I began to wonder if P. Panurge, whoever she or he is could be the next member of Ink Spill‘s “One Club”.
So I throw it out to any cartoon detectives/historians out there: who is P. Panurge? Any ideas please contact me.
I suspect that P. Panurge is a pseudonym. Panurge doesn’t seem to be a real surname. I don’t find any genealogical data on it, at any rate. It seems more likely the name was taken from a major character in Gargantua and Pantagruel by Rabelais. It’s the sort of thing an educated person might have recalled from a college course in French literature. The signature itself seems somewhat improvised. I think Panurge was signed first and that initial P. was added by a different hand and likely with a different pen as an afterthought. I can just imagine Ross insisting that he be given a first initial.
So whose pseudonym is it? I. Klein seems a strong possibility. The database attributes the cartoon to him. His style by 1928 seems fairly close to Panurge’s, Klein’s style being extremely versatile. He’s one of the few who signed his name with a first initial, Otto Soglow being another. He liked to set cartoons in the mass transit system (5/23/1925, 9/18/1926, 1/22/1927). It was also not so very unusual for him to have more than one cartoon in an issue (9/12/1925, 6/19/1926, 8/7/1926, 8/21/1926, 12/18/1926, 1/22/1927, etc.).
I can only speculate what might have transpired. Perhaps a fellow cartoonist gave him a ribbing for having two cartoons in an issue and he decided to disguise this fact the next time it happened. Perhaps he left the cartoon unsigned and someone else signed it as a practical joke. Maybe there’s an inside joke here somewhere. Someone might have thought he was demonstrating a Rabelaisian wit. Or maybe Klein used the pseudonym because he didn’t like the composition. The central placement of that pole seems unsatisfactory to me.
So, I have no proof, just a strong suspicion that P. Panurge is really I. Klein. Barring other evidence that P. Panurge exists, I don’t think I’d add him to the One Club, but I’d love to know what else you come up with.