Dream of the Rarebit Fiend He addressed religious leaders, alcoholism, homelessness, political speeches, suicide, fashion, and other topics, whereas his other strips were fantasy or had seemingly vague, timeless backgrounds. The strip referenced contemporary events such as the 1904 election of Theodore Roosevelt; the recently built Flatiron Building (1902) and St. Regis Hotel (1904) in New York City; and the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–05. The rarebit is a dish typically made with rich cheese thinned with ale and served melted on toast with cayenne and mustard mixed in. McCay used it despite its innocuousness—cultural theorist Scott Bukatman states rarebit was not the sort of dish
Toast rack resemble the shape of a toast rack. The 'toast rack passenger carriage' has been a design feature of railways since their inception, with the name particularly common on miniature and light railways, where it refers to open-sided carriages (with or, especially on miniature railways, without roofs) where the essential design is a flat frame with a series of upright seats set at right-angles to the direction of the track, thus forming a crude representation of a toast rack. When the term 'toast rack carriage' is used of larger railways (up to, and sometimes including, standard gauge) it refers to coaches