HISTORY AND CARTOONS

Auckland Star, Volume LXI, Issue 172, 23 July 1930, Page 21

HISTORY AND CARTOONS

TRIALS OF A CARICATURIST.

FORTY YEARS' EXPERIENCE.

"BLO'S" REMINISCENCES

Another aspect of the story of some of the names famous in New Zealand history was told to memhers of the Auckland "Advertising Club yesterday afternoon by Mr, W. Blomfield (Bio") "I remember," he said, ae he started on a story which held his audience in a perpetual smile, "how I first began to draw." In his home at Thames, there was that common feature of houses in those times, a tarred chimney on the outside wall—a "swell"'chimney, as Mr. Blomfield termed it. That was his first blackboard. Just opposite the house was a church, and the miners who used to lean against the picket fence were the first and the willing sitbjecte of ft lad Of 'seven"-""Then I grew lip and EadWb go to church myself," bemoaned Mr. Blomfield. Sir Julius Vogel Caricatured. His first caricature of anybody in public life was Sir Julius Vogel, whom Mr. Blomfield saw speaking in a hall at the foot of Victoria Street. "He'was & broad-browed man with a great prominent nose," remarked Mr. Blomfield. "He must have beeli suffering from rheumatics or .something, for he_ was wheeled on to the stage in a chair. I don't recall much of what he said, but I do remember the picture I got of him." Mr. Blomfield passed the original drawing round, and at the same time, one of Sir George Grey, which, he said, was the only one he had ever seen of Sir George speaking. The famous statesman was shown with one hand in the pocket of his old-fashioned cut-away tail-coat. Whiskers, Wisdom and Politics. "Now, it's a curious thing," Mr. Blomfield continued', "but most of the men in public life then wore beards. Whiskers and wisdom seem to go together. That's the trouble with those iri° politics at present. However, they made splendid subjects." Then he spoke intimately of Ballance and "Dick" Seddon, and John McKenzie, of Cheviot Estate fame, and other names which the present generation have either, forgotten or have never heard of.' But "Bio" had known them all, and had drawn them all, and he gave his listeners the benefit of over 40 years of ripe experience. "I cartooned 'Dick' Seddon from the time he walked on to the public stage until he went off it," he said. Twice Threatened. "Now the chairman has referred to the risks I ran in following out my profession," continued Mi'. Blomfield, I was threatened twice." He described how he had caricatured the then German Consul in Auckland, a Mr. Carl Seegner. "He wore a high top hat with big, wind holes round the side. Anyway, I drew liim, and one day some time after, he strutted fiercely up—he was a big, •Upstanding man—and bailed mes up ™ a corner by the post office. 'Blomfield, he said, in- his clipped, precise AngloGerman, 'I challenge you, to sword or to pistols as you please. If yon do not accept my challenge, I will run you throuo-h with a sword.' The usual crowd oathered, and I watched him disappear with some trepidation; but nothing happened." »' Mr. Blomfield told anecdote after anecdote of public men and events m Auckland since the days 40 years ago when he learned his trade (and, incidentally, as he said, "the fine art of loafing") and the time the story took in the telling seemed short.'