---
title: Bedtime Story
url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/bedtime-story-1956/
description: A man whose sleeve reads 'Adlai' sits beside a bed holding a picture book titled 'The Wicked Old Elephant', which shows a snarling horned elephant.
section: Collection
---

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3. Bedtime Story

[![Bedtime Story, 1956 US cartoon: A man whose sleeve reads 'Adlai' sits beside a bed holding a picture book titled 'The Wicked](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/bedtime-story-1956.jpg)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/bedtime-story-1956.jpg)

# Bedtime Story

A man whose sleeve reads 'Adlai' sits beside a bed holding a picture book titled 'The Wicked Old Elephant', which shows a snarling horned elephant, while a wide-eyed figure in the bed clutches the covers; a crate marked 'Farm Vote' and a toy tractor stand in the foreground. The cartoon argues that the Democratic candidate is trying to frighten farm voters with stories of the Republican Party. The technique tell is the fear-appeal framing, shown as a bedtime scare story.

## Propaganda techniques used in this cartoon

[Fear appeal](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/fear-appeal/)

## Text on the object

Original (English) · read from the image, not independently checked

```
The Wicked Old Elephant

ADLAI

FARM VOTE

JIM BERRYMAN WASHINGTON STAR
```

[← ...And so ends an 'open convention'](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/berryman-so-ends-an-open-convention-1956/) [Monopolizing the Water Hole →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/monopolizing-the-water-hole-1956/)

## More propaganda examples that use the same techniques

- [Miniature of Pope Urban II at the Council of Clermont, Les Passages d'outremer (BnF Fr. 5594, fol. 19r)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/passages-doutremer-council-of-clermont-colombe-1474/) (France · 1474 · Testimonial, Fear appeal). Content note: Medieval religious imagery and a French text describing alleged killings and captivity of eastern Christians, as used to argue for the First Crusade; the text is shown as written.
- [Anacoana fut pendue sans raison (engraving in Le miroir de la cruelle et horrible tyrannie espagnole)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/anacoana-hanged-miroir-tyrannie-espagnole-1620/) (Dutch Republic · 1620 · Fear appeal, Name-calling). Content note: Engraving of a hanged, bare-breasted Taino woman, burning huts and people being killed by Spanish soldiers.
- [Der Warner (broadsheet lampoon on the Jesuits after Breitenfeld and Rain)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/der-warner-anti-jesuit-broadsheet-1632/) (Holy Roman Empire · 1632 · Scapegoating, Fear appeal)
- [Sans-Culottes, feeding Europe with the Bread of Liberty (James Gillray)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sans-culottes-bread-of-liberty-gillray-1793/) (Kingdom of Great Britain · Jan 12, 1793 · Fear appeal, Name-calling)
- [Proclamation de Sonthonax en créole, Cap-Français (Proclamation of Commissioner Sonthonax in Creole)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sonthonax-proclamation-creole-1793/) (France · Aug 29, 1793 · Fear appeal, Scapegoating). Content note: Colonial-era proclamation on slavery and emancipation in Saint-Domingue; speaks of slaves, whips and 'Nègues' in period terms.
- [Gazette of the United States, "The Jeffersoniad" no. VIII, 14 August 1800](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/gazette-us-jeffersoniad-1800/) (United States · Aug 14, 1800 · Name-calling, Fear appeal)
- [Tyrants Prostrate, Liberty Triumphant (pro-Polk cartoon on Dorr), 1844](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/tyrants-prostrate-liberty-triumphant-polk-1844/) (United States · 1844 · Name-calling, Fear appeal). Content note: Speech balloons contain anti-Catholic and nativist wording ('the ruins of Popery') in the mouths of the Whig figures, written by a Democratic cartoonist and shown unaltered.
- [Brolej Žemajčiaj! (Brothers Samogitians!): hand-painted broken-cross poster](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/brolej-zemajciaj-broken-cross-1862/) (Russian Empire · 1862 · Fear appeal, Transfer)