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SIGNATURES
Identified individuals are represented by a biographical sketch, a list of connections to other signatures, and, in most cases, an artifact from the Ransom Centers collections. Help us identify more signatures by submitting your suggested identification.
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THE DOOR
Location on door: front, panel 2
OSCAR EDWARD CESARE
Originally from Sweden, Oscar Edward Cesare (1885-1948) studied art briefly in Paris and then in Buffalo, New York, before moving to Chicago to begin a career as a newspaper cartoonist for the Chicago Tribune. By 1911, Cesare had settled in New York City, where his cartoons appeared in the New York Sun and New York Post, and in magazines such as The New Yorker and Bookman. During World War I, Cesare's drawings of ships and battles appeared in the New York Times, and he published more war sketches in his 1916 book One Hundred Cartoons. Cesare distinguished himself as an illustrator with his portrait sketches of prominent literary, political, and cultural figures such as Joseph Conrad, Sinclair Lewis, and Ethel Rosenberg. Often his portraits appeared alongside interviews conducted by Cesare himself--among them Orville Wright, Benito Mussolini, and Vladimir Lenin.
"Books in Demand at Public Libaries" in the Bookman (November 1921)
Bestseller and similar lists can reveal much about their time; this example shows that two of Cesare's books were in everyone's mind in late 1921; among "general books," as opposed to just fiction, two anonymous publications of Cesare's political cartoons appear as regional and national bestsellers: Mirrors of Washington and Mirrors of Downing Street.