Playing With Dolls    (April Fool's Day - 1948)

The April 3 issue of the Saturday Evening Post featured an April Fool cover by Norman Rockwell, in which the artist had placed 56 "mistakes and incongruities." It was the third such April Fool cover by Rockwell. (The previous ones ran in 1943 and 1945.)



A list of all 56 mistakes appeared inside the magazine:

1. Two kinds of molding on cupboard.
2. North American Pileated Woodpecker head on crane's body.
3. Coffeepot spout upside down.
4. Barbed wire instead of clothesline.
5. Insigne on back of fireman's helmet.
6. Green and red lights reversed on ship's lantern.
7. Beast crouched on upper shelf.
8. Cup not hanging by handle.
9. Electric bulbs growing on plant.
10. Head of little girl on man's bust.
11. Rat's tail on chipmunk.
12. Penholder with pencil eraser.
13. Top of brass vase suspended.
14. Face in clock.
15. Candle where kerosene lamp should be.
16. Sampler dated 1216.
17. Winter seen through left window, summer through right.
18. Antique dealer's head on dolls.
19. Nine branches on traditional seven-branch candelabra.
20. Girl's hair in pigtail on one side, loose on other.
21. Titles on books vertical instead of horizontal.
22. Girl's sweater buttoned wrong way.
23. Mouthpiece on both ends of phone.
24. Phone not connected.
25. Goat's head, deer's antlers.
26. No shelf under books.
27. Lace cuff on man's shirt.
28. Five fingers and thumb on girl's hand.
29. Gun barrel in wrong place.
30. Saddle on animal.
31. Potted plant on lighted stove.
32. Girl's purse is a book.
33. Only half a strap on girl's purse.
34. Skunk in girl's arms.
35. Sea gull with crane's legs.
36. Stovepipe missing.
37. Mona Lisa has halo.
38. Mona Lisa facing wrong way.
39. Abraham Lincoln with General Grant's military coat.
40. Stove has April Fool on it.
41. Hoofs instead of feet on doll.
42. Little girl sitting on nothing.
43. Rogers group is combination of soldier from Our Hero and girl from "Blushing Bride."
44. Brass kettle has two spouts.
45. Spur on antique dealer's shoe.
46. Mouse and ground mole conferring.
47. Ground mole's tracks in wooden floor.
48. Dog's head on cat's body.
49. Raccoon's tail on eat's body.
50. Ball fringe standing straight up at angle.
51. Stove minus one leg.
52. Two kinds of floor.
53. Signature reversed.
54. Last name spelled wrong.
55. Flowers growing in floor.
56. Girl's socks don't match.