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(BLACK MEMORABILIA.) HUMORISTIC PUBILSHING CO.
Martha the
Good Negress.
Chromolithographic comic strip, 15x10-2/2 inches, consisting of 16
panels. Matted.
Printed in France “Expressly for the Humoristic Publishing Co. Kansas City, MO”
by Imagerie d’Epinal, circa 1900
[600/800]
The story of Martha the Good Negress (is she an exception?) is an astonishing piece of racist
propaganda, aimed at what had to be a truly naïve audience, even for 1900. It seems that there
was a rich planter in Martinique who so respected his “slaves” that he paid them for their labor.
But he fell on bad times, had to “dismiss” them all, except his wife’s favorite, Martha. Leaving
her native “America” (Martinique) makes Martha deathly ill, but her mistress stays by her
bedside until she can travel—with her parrot “Jack.” Later, in France, a man offers Martha
300 francs for Jack, but she refuses—that is, until her mistress is “ruined by a lawsuit.”Then
Martha sells Jack for 300 francs and saves her mistress’s bacon, and the whole family is off
to Martinique once again, where all of the Negroes cry “Long live the whites,” and the whites
cry “Long live the Good Blacks.” Amazing!