Judge, 1889-05-25 · page 18 of 18
Judge — May 25, 1889 — page 18: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This is primarily an **advertisement**, not a cartoon or satire. It's a full-page promotional piece for the Mutual Life Insurance Company of New York, published in *Judge* magazine (likely 1889, based on the 1888 financial data cited). The ad makes no satirical point—it straightforwardly touts the company as "the best judge of life insurance" and "the largest and best life insurance company in the world." It lists impressive financial statistics: $126 million in assets, $103 million in new business for 1888, and $272 million paid to policyholders since the company's founding. This represents honest-to-goodliness corporate advertising in a humor magazine, which *Judge* regularly published to fund operations. There's no irony, caricature, or political commentary intended—just corporate self-promotion masquerading as factual endorsement.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
THE BEST OF LIFE INSURANCE THE PUBLIC. THE MOST EXTENSIVELY PATRONIZED LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY IN THE WORLD IS Mutual LIF E Insurance Ge. * = = * of New York. ASSETS, - - $126, 082,153.56. THE LARGEST AND BEST LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY IN THE WORLD. The New Business of the Mutual Life Insurance Company in 1888 Exceeded $103,000,000. Its Business shows the Greatest Comparative Gain made by any Company during the past year, including A gain in assets of . . q : . . i . $7,2'75,301.68 A gain in income of 5 ‘ . . . ; ‘ . 8,096,010.06 A gain in new premiums of ; : ‘ 4 3 i 2,333,406.00 A gain in surplus of aa ae F ‘ ‘ F , . 1,645,622.11 A gain in new business of : F ‘ * ‘ . 33,'756,792.85 A gain of risks in force F : . 54, 496,251.85 THE MdTd4AL LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY HAS PAID TO POLICY-HOLDERS SINCE ORCANIZATION $272,481,839.82. comicbooks.com