Meet the American Worker | Grizly Adams

Meet King Joe
by Sutherland (John) Productions, Inc.

Publication date 1949
Usage Public Domain
Topics Cold War, Animation: Advertising, Capitalism
Digitizing sponsor Harding College, Extension Department / Alfred P. Sloan Foundation
Cold War cartoon aimed at American workers with the objective of convincing them of their good fortune.
Shotlist
Presents 'KING JOE' as the average American working man who, by virtue of his high wages and short hours, is king of the world's workers.
Ken Smith sez: "American labor, management and capital -- the greatest production team in the history of mankind -- have made the United States the industrial master of the world."
This theatrical cartoon is one of the "fun and facts about America" series, made "to create a deeper understanding of what has made America the finest place in the world to live." Actually, it was financed by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, created by the chairman of General Motors, and its message in the labor-unruly late forties is clear. Joe, who wears overalls and talks with a pseudo-Brooklyn accent, is "king of the workers of the world" NOT because he is worthy, but because the machinery in his factory "multiplies strength and efficiency." This is part of "the "American way of doing things," the narrator tells us. We also learn that Joe is "king" not because he can exert power over anything (union rabble-rousers take note), but because "he can buy more with his wages than any other worker on the globe." Joe dutifully goes on a shopping spree to demonstrate.
As proof that the American system is the most wonderful on earth, the narrator informs us that Americans own 72% of the cars in the world, 92% of the bathtubs, and "practically all the refrigerators in existence." In the end, Joe sits atop a giant machine that spits out futuristic cars, TVs and washing machines at the yank of a lever. While America The Beautiful plays underneath, the narrator sums up the attitude industrial America was pushing: "Labor and management must continue to increase the production of better goods at lower prices so that more people will be able to buy the things that make life easier and happier for all of us."
A well-financed Technicolor cartoon.

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