Join, or Die
Join, or Die. is a political cartoon attributed to Benjamin Franklin. The original publication by the "Pennsylvania Gazette" on May 9, 1754, is the earliest known pictorial representation of colonial union produced by an American colonist in Colonial America. It is a woodcut showing a snake cut into eighths, with each segment labeled with the initials of one of the American colonies or regions. New England was represented as one segment, rather than the four colonies it was at that time. Delaware was not listed separately as it was part of Pennsylvania. Georgia, however, was omitted completely. Thus, it has eight segments of a snake rather than the traditional 13 colonies. The poster focused solely on the colonies that claimed shared identities as Americans. The cartoon appeared along with Franklin's editorial about the "disunited state" of the colonies and helped make his point about the importance of colonial unity. It later became a symbol of colonial freedom during the American Revolutionary War.
Q2916094
political cartoon
Concept
Q34969
Benjamin Franklin
PER
Q3106560
Pennsylvania Gazette
MEDIA
Q179997
Colonial America
LOC
Q173242
woodcut
Concept
Q2102
snake
Concept
Q179997
American colonies
LOC
Q18389
New England
LOC
Q2571194
Delaware
LOC
Q2475732
Pennsylvania
LOC
Q785035
Georgia
LOC
Q846570
Americans
Concept
Q40949
American Revolutionary War
EVE
Q1136099
Join, or Die
ORG
1754-05-09T00:00:00Z^^http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#dateTime
May 9, 1754
DATE
+13^^http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#decimal
13
NUMBER
instance of
creator
published in
publication date
located in the administrative territorial entity