That political symbology came from....

Ever wondered? Fact Monster credits both symbols to the agile mind of an immigrant German-American cartoonist named Thomas Nast, but Wikipedia says he's only responsible for actually inventing the Republican Elephant. He did popularize the Democratic Donkey, however, but it wasn't invented by him.

His bio in Wikipedia does make interesting reading, though, because he was a very famous early cartoonist whose work had considerable effect in his day.

And it's nice to see some of my American cousins finally waking up and asking themselves 'What the hell's going on here anyway?' rather than just sitting there watching the game on TV and saying things like 'Sapphire, get yo' black ass off dat d'ere table d'ere, y'all hear?'