RUBE GOLDBERG

By Travis Bearden

The artist that I am studying for Project Week is Reuben Garrett Lucious

Goldberg, more commonly known as Rube Goldberg. He was born on July 4th, 1883

in San Francisco, California and died on December 7th, 1970 in New York City. He is

most famous for his cartoons of elaborate contraptions and inventions, some of

which he turned into actual contraptions.

Rube Goldberg grew up in San Francisco, California with his mom, dad and six

other siblings. He started to trace illustrations when he was four, then took

professional drawing lessons when he was eleven. His dad was a police and fire

commissioner and encouraged Rube to become an engineer. He studied

Engineering at UC Berkeley, graduating in 1904 and getting a job with the San

Francisco Water and Sewers Department. Rube was unhappy designing sewer pipes

and quit after six months on the job. He started working for the San Francisco

Chronicle as a sports cartoonist, making much less money but doing what he loved.

He moved to New York City in 1907 to work for the New York Evening Mail and The

New York Sun. Rube became most well known for his cartoon strip starring the

character Professor Lucifer Gorganzola Butts and his crazy, overcomplicated

inventions.

Rube Goldberg wasn’t involved in any specific art movement, although he created

cartoons, schematics and working sculptures of some of his inventions, known as

Rube Golberg Machines. He won the Pulitzer Prize in 1948 for his political cartoon

showing an image of a nice peaceful house on top of an atomic bomb, teetering on a

cliff labeled World Control, about to fall into an endless pit labeled World
Destruction. In 1930, Rube Goldberg released a movie called Soup to Nuts, starring

Ted Healy and The Three Stooges and featuring some of his machines. By the 1960’s

his contraptions and any other overly-complicated machines inspired by his were

known as Rube Goldberg Machines. They have been featured in films and television,

including Pee-wee’s Big Adventure, Back to the Future, Wallace and Gromit and Home

Alone. My favorite Rube Goldberg illustration is called The Jaywalker Scooper. The

jaywalker will get scooped up by the spoon on the automobile and will get dumped

into a funnel which drops him in a canon on top of the automobile, but before he

goes into the canon he hits a paddle which pulls the string on the canon, shooting

him three blocks away to get him out of the way of the cars. I like it because it’s very

creative, useful and funny. I like the guy in the car looking so satisfied with himself.

I learned three interesting facts about Rube Goldberg while researching him.

First, he was one of seven children and three of them died in childhood. It must

have been pretty crazy to have six brothers and sisters, and I can’t imagine what it

must have been like to lose three siblings. Second, his sons Thomas and George

changed their last name to George during World War II because Rube was receiving

death threats for his political cartoons. He wanted to keep his sons safe because

Jewish people were persecuted more than the average person at this time. Lastly,

Rube Goldberg co-founded the National Cartoonists Society, which presents the

Reuben Award each year to its most outstanding cartoonist. Past winners include

Bill Waterson for Calvin and Hobbes and Gary Larson for The Far Side.

Rube Goldberg was a unique artist because of his intricate contraptions that he

invented using his knowledge of engineering and illustrating. I love his art because
of the goofy cartoons and the ridiculous inventions for simple actions. I like

inventing Rube Goldberg Machines of my own, because it’s fun to think of how one

thing will lead to another and what the whole contraption will end up doing. The

process of making the machine involves lots of trial and error as well as backwards

planning. His artwork will continue to be remembered because everyone loves

chain reactions, and Rube Goldberg Machines continue to be built and featured in

television, movies, music videos and Youtube videos.

Bibliography

Books

Websites

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rube_Goldberg
https://www.rubegoldberg.com/about/

Videos

“A quick biographical overview”, Eric Haines, 2011

“Something for Nothing”, The Jam Handy Organization, 1940
“This Too Shall Pass”, OK Go, 2010