The Darktown Yacht Club--Ladies Day: In cose I will, Honey

The late nineteenth-century Darktown prints by Currier & Ives depict racist stereotypes that are offensive and disturbing. The Metropolitan Museum of Art preserves such works to shed light on their historical context and to enable the study and evaluation of racism.　

This print depicts caricatured Black (African American) people in a boating mishap. A huge woman (wearing a straw hat, an outfit with billowing red/pale yellow striped sleeves, and a yellow skirt), is surprised to discover that she and her end of the rowboat (which she has just boarded) is sinking into water, while the boat's other end shoots upward out of the water. As a result, three shocked sailors in the boat (and their oars) are tumbling down the near-vertical rowboat interior--one of them grabs the legs of the sinking woman. At left, a fourth sailor is aghast as he dives over his falling oar into the water. All the sailors wear white sailor suits with blue stars on their collars. A fifth man (wearing a blue jacket), who had helped the woman into the boat, is also falling into the water between the boat and the pier. At right, on the wooden pier near ladder-like steps, a man supports a swooning woman (wearing a pink-red dress over a blouse with billowing sleeves); above them a yacht club banner is flying. In the right background, on the shore across the water, is a house.and a barn. The title and caption are imprinted in the bottom margin.


Nathaniel Currier (1813–1888), whose successful New York-based lithography firm began in 1835, produced thousands of prints in various sizes that together create a vivid panorama of mid-to-late nineteenth century American life and its history. People eagerly acquired such lithographs featuring picturesque scenery, rural and city views, ships, railroads, portraits, hunting and fishing scenes, domestic life and numerous other subjects, as an inexpensive way to decorate their homes or business establishments. As the firm expanded, Nathaniel included his younger brother Charles in the business. In 1857, James Merritt Ives (1824–1895), the firm's accountant since 1852 and Charles's brother-in-law, was made a business partner. Subsequently renamed Currier & Ives, the firm continued via their successors until 1907.