The biting art of caricature has been around for hundreds of years, and who makes a better target than politicians? With Presidents’ Day nearly upon us, it’s worth another look at Heritage’s collection of presidential cartoons by syndicated political cartoonist Taylor Jones.

Jones has been drawing political cartoons since he was five years old, he just didn’t know it until he was in college. After a childhood visit to the home of Thomas Jefferson, he devoured a book on the presidents and quickly memorized their names and faces. He was fascinated by Chester Alan Arthur’s muttonchops (and really, who isn’t?). The son of an illustrator, he used some of his father’s sketchpads and began his political cartooning career.

Fast-forward to adulthood, Jones became a syndicated political cartoonist whose work has appeared in The New Yorker, U.S. News & World Report, The New Republic and The Chicago Tribune along with dozens of other newspapers and magazines. In this series of works, originally completed in 1982, he has directed his cynical gaze on the Presidents of the United States. Through his pictures and accompanying verse, he has laid out their strengths and weaknesses, faults and foibles. Here for example, is the poem for Chester Alan Arthur, who was president from 1881-1885:

Now President Arthur set a most royal routine
Rising late in the morning, then only to preen

To his warm bubble bath he’d add a gallon of milk
Then doff his pajamas, which were sewed of fine silk

For an hour after bathing he’d fuss with his hair
Before giving thought to descending the stair

On a brunch of poached quail’s eggs King Arthur would fatten
Then loll through the p.m. in French furs and satin

… But as for those muttonchops, it’s often been said
He trained White House squirrels to perch on his head

The Heritage collection includes 39 examples of these caricatures from George Washington to Ronald Reagan. You can see all of Heritage’s presidential caricatures and their accompanying poems by following clicking here.