In the early 1800s, Akin worked as an engraver for
Edmund March Blunt in Newburyport. "In late October 1804 the two men argued publicly, and in the course of the disagreement Blunt threw an iron
skillet at Akin, hitting an unfortunate passerby. Akin, uninjured, retaliated with a deragotory
print of Blunt entitled 'Infuriated Despondency' and a verse he called 'A Skillet Song.'"[4] The caricature was later featured in the Newburyport Herald in 1805 and in pottery throughout London and
Liverpool in 2006, heaping scorn upon Blunt and his descendants. A few examples still exist.[5]
Images
Examples of Akin's work:
Illustration by Akin published in
John Drayton's A View of South Carolina, 1802 (Winterthur Museum)
"Infuriated Despondency," 1805; satirical portrait of Edmund M. Blunt wielding footed skillet (Worcester Art Museum)
"Caucus curs in full yell," 1824; critique of "the press's treatment of
Andrew Jackson, and on the practice of nominating candidates by caucus during the
presidential race of 1824" (Library of Congress)[6]
1830 caricature of American Christian
Sabbatarians, whose "goal was to prevent the federal government from desecrating the Sabbath by requiring that the mails be transported and the post offices open to the public seven days a week" (American Antiquarian Society)[7]
Further reading
Wikimedia Commons has media related to James Akin.
Nina Fletcher Little. "The Cartoons of James Akin upon Liverpool Ware." Old-Time New England, (January 1938)
Lewis C. Rubenstein. "James Akin in Newburyport." Essex Institute Historical Collections (1966)
^Christina H. Nelson. Transfer-Printed Creamware and Pearlware for the American Market. Winterthur Portfolio, Vol. 15, No. 2 (Summer, 1980), pp. 93–115
JSTOR1180534
^Stagg, Allison (January 2010).
"All in my eye!". Common-place. Retrieved March 15, 2019.
^Richard R. John. Taking Sabbatarianism Seriously: The Postal System, the Sabbath, and the Transformation of American Political Culture. Journal of the Early Republic, Vol. 10, No. 4 (Winter 1990)
JSTOR3123626