Judge — November 11, 1893 — page 9: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This Judge cartoon satirizes the difficulty of operating early typewriters. A bearded man sits at a desk with a typewriter, looking frustrated and gesturing in exasperation. The visible caption reads "thing make it work!" (likely "I can't make it work!"), expressing his struggles. The cartoon's title, "A Rat-Typewriter," appears to be a pun—possibly suggesting the machine is as unpredictable or difficult as herding rats. The illustration captures the era when typewriters were relatively new office technology that many found temperamental and frustrating to use. The man's disheveled appearance and body language convey the irritation these machines regularly caused their operators, mocking both the technology's imperfections and users' struggles to master them.