Brother Jonathan is the personification of New England. He was also used as an emblem of the United States in general, and can be an allegory of capitalism. His too-short pants, too-tight waistcoat and old-fashioned style reflect his taste for inexpensive, second-hand products and efficient use of means.
Brother Jonathan soon became a stock fictional character, developed as a good-natured parody of all New England during the early American Republic. He was widely popularized by the weekly newspaper Brother Jonathan and the humor magazine Yankee Notions.[1]
Brother Jonathan was usually depicted in editorial cartoons and patriotic posters outside New England as a long-winded New Englander who dressed in striped trousers, somber black coat and stove-pipe hat. Inside New England, "Brother Jonathan" was depicted as an enterprising and active businessman who blithely boasted of Yankee conquests for the Universal Yankee Nation.[2]
After 1865, the garb of Brother Jonathan was emulated by Uncle Sam, a common personification of the continental government of the United States.
- ^ Yankee Notions in Google Books.
- ^ Teach Us History – Here, "Brother Jonathan" is clearly a representative of a "Yankee", a New Englander, administering pear-juice to John Bull on behalf of Admiral Perry, during the War of 1812.