Photo Exhibit Puts Ronald Reagan Humor on Display

His ‘velvet weapon’

M.M. O'Keefe
7 min readMay 18, 2020
Author montage of photos assembled from the online exhibit, The “President and Humor,” at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library.

Humor flowed from Ronald Reagan.

The 40th U.S. president charmed the public, disarmed political foes and alarmed the Soviet Union with a seemingly endless supply of funny jokes and sight gags.

The humor and wit of Ronald Reagan are on display and recorded for history in a refreshingly funny exhibit of 31 photos in the otherwise serious Ronald Reagan Presidential Library. The collection is titled “The President and Humor.”

The photos show Reagan’s humor at its best.

Ronald Reagan’s jokes sometimes jabbed, but they didn’t go for the jugular, in stark contrast to the mean-spirited digs and biting sarcasm that characterize today’s brand of political humor. Look at these photos and you might miss a bygone era of American history when Democrats and Republicans socialized and laughed at themselves and each other.

Ronald Reagan Presidential Library: Reagan wore a mask of his Democratic opponent, Michael Dukakis, in 1988.

Gentle humor that connected

Ronald Reagan’s jokes were sometimes corny, hardly ever dirty and almost always good-natured — delivered with the impeccable timing of a former Hollywood actor.

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M.M. O'Keefe

I write about faith, fathering, sports, recovery and history — hoping to inspire you.