Sam, We Am

The Overlook

By Tom Clavin

“The Overlook” appears every Wednesday at tomclavin.substack.com. An overlook is usually a place from which one can see in many if not all directions, including where one has been and where one is going. If you enjoy the column, please "like" it and let me know what you think by commenting (check out previous ones while you're at it). All support is appreciated. Don't forget to hit the ‘Subscribe’ button – it’s free!

          Have you ever wondered why the United States has the nickname “Uncle Sam”? The explanation involves a newspaper story that was published 210 years ago this week.

          Samuel Wilson was a meatpacker who supplied barrels of beef to the Army during the War of 1812. At the Wilson plant in Troy, New York, as they were readied for shipping the barrels were stamped with “U.S.” for, of course, the United States. Soon, though, suppliers and soldiers referred to the barrels as having come from “Uncle Sam” Wilson. An article about Wilson that appeared in a local newspaper on September 7, 1813, brought this to the attention of the public and over time Uncle Sam grew as a nickname for the young country.

          It really took off during World War I, but before we get to that, it is interesting to note that the earliest known personification of the America (pre-United States) was as a woman. She was named Columbia, and she first appeared in 1738 and sometimes was associated with another female personification, Lady Liberty. When the American Revolution began in 1775, another fictional figure, Brother Jonathan, became popular. He hung around longer in the public imagination, but Columbia began to fade. She was effectively abandoned once she became the mascot of Columbia Pictures in the 1920s.

In 1835, Brother Jonathan made a reference to Uncle Sam, implying that they symbolized different things: Brother Jonathan was the country itself, while Uncle Sam was the government and its power.  A clockmaker in an 1849 comedic novel explains, “We call the American public Uncle Sam, as you call the British ‘John Bull.’” By the 1850s, the names Brother Jonathan and Uncle Sam were being used nearly interchangeably, to the point that images of what had previously been called "Brother Jonathan" were being called "Uncle Sam.” The appearance of both personifications varied wildly. For example, one depiction of Uncle Sam in 1860 showed him looking like Benjamin Franklin while a contemporaneous depiction of Brother Jonathan looks more like the modern version of Uncle Sam, though without a goatee.

Uncle Sam did not get a standard appearance, even with the effective abandonment of Brother Jonathan near the end of the Civil War, until the well-known recruitment image of Uncle Sam was first created by James Montgomery Flagg during World War I. The image was inspired by a British recruitment poster showing the famous British general Lord Kitchener in a similar pose. It is this image more than any other that has influenced the modern appearance of Uncle Sam: an elderly white man with white hair and a goatee, wearing a white top hat with white stars on a blue band, a blue tail coat, and red-and-white-striped trousers.

It is generally accepted that Flagg's depiction of Uncle Sam was shown publicly for the first time on the cover of the magazine Leslie’s Weekly on July 6, 1916, with the caption, "What Are You Doing for Preparedness?" More than four million copies of this image were printed in 1917 and 1918. Flagg's image was also used extensively in World War II, during which the U.S. was code-named "Samland" by the German intelligence system. “I Want You . . . for the U.S. Army” Uncle Sam ordered, pointing, on thousands of posters. The term was central in the song "The Yankee Doodle Boy,” which was featured in the 1942 big-screen musical Yankee Doodle Dandy, with James Cagney’s Oscar-winning performance as George M. Cohan.

We don’t see Uncle Sam nearly as much these days but there are two memorials to him, both of which commemorate the life of Samuel Wilson. The Uncle Sam Memorial Statue is in Arlington, Massachusetts, where Wilson was born, and the second memorial is near his long-term residence in Riverfront Park in Troy. Samuel Wilson died on July 31, 1854, aged 87, and is buried in the Oakwood Cemetery in Troy.

In 1989, "Uncle Sam Day" became official. A Congressional joint resolution designated September 13 as Uncle Sam Day, the birthday of Samuel Wilson – so be ready to celebrate next week. In 2015, the family history company MyHeritage researched “Uncle Sam's” family tree and claims to have tracked down his living relatives.

Something else to celebrate is the publication this week of Son of the Old West: The Odyssey of Charlie Siringo: Cowboy, Detective, Writer of the Wild Frontier. Aside from enjoying the book on its own merits, the timing is helpful to me. I am working on a book tentatively titled Bandit Heaven and it includes Siringo. He was not just an effective lawman in the later stage of the Wild West, he was probably the best detective the Pinkerton Agency had. He was a relentless pursuer, fast with his gun, and usually got his man.

Nathan Ward, the author, has done a fine job in presenting Siringo’s fascinating frontier career and Son of the Old West has sure given a boost to my research efforts. Hope the book finds an appreciative audience.

Tom Clavin is the bestselling author/co-author of 25 books, including Follow Me to Hell, published in April by St. Martin’s Press. The trade paperback edition of The Last Hill (with Bob Drury) will be published next week. Please go to your local bookstore or to Bookshop.org, Amazon.com, BN.com, or tomclavin.com to purchase a copy.