ABSTRACT
Mr. Ngyuen, a history teacher who usually relies on traditional instructional methods, is teaching a lesson on progressivism in his 8th grade U.S. history class. He wants to lecture on Theodore Roosevelt’s trust busting policies, but he decides to start class by having students spend a few minutes analyzing a political cartoon from that era. He does some searching and fi nds the perfect political cartoon: an image painted in 1904 of an octopus-like monster, labeled “Standard Oil” with tentacles wrapped around a statehouse, other government buildings, and business executives (see Figure 3.1). The monster’s eyes are fi xed on the White House and a tentacle is reaching in that direction (Keppler, 1904). Mr. Ngyuen is excited by his discovery of this cartoon because it is a wonderful primary source that shows the fears of proponents of Theodore Roosevelt’s trust busting. He hopes that during the analysis of the cartoon students will become curious about the conditions that existed at the time and will focus better during his lecture on Roosevelt and the Progressive Era.
