Skip to main content
No image number on slide
Whirligig: Policeman
No image number on slide

Whirligig: Policeman

DateProbably 1915-1930
OriginAmerica
MediumWood, iron, sheet iron, lead, and paint
Dimensions23" x 6 3/8" x 2 7/8" (58.4 x 16.1 x 6.6 cm.)
Credit LineMuseum Purchase
Object number1974.700.1
Label TextJudging by surviving examples, authority figures were popular subjects among whirligig makers. Special delight was taken in spoofing military figures and policemen; their serious expressions, crisp uniforms, and military bearing are undermined by arms that flail and bodies that spin out of control in the wind.

The arms or paddles on early whirligigs are often made of flat boards or sheet metal mounted at ninety degrees or less to one another. After the popularization of the airplane, whirligigs with paddles configured like airplane propellors occasionally appear. This Policeman has such paddles: in relation to one another, the angle of the blades is not significantly different, but the shape of the figure's arm paddles at the shoulder is not unlike the gentle, swelling curve of a propellor blade at the hub. This whirligig's imaginatively stylized hands are a rarely seen feature.
InscribedNone found
MarkingsNone found
ProvenanceMaze Pottinger Antiques, Bloomfield Hills, Mich.