Judge — December 2, 1899 — page 16: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This Judge magazine cartoon satirizes Irish immigrant domestic workers through ethnic stereotyping. Two women named "Dooley" and "Ellen"—identified by their Irish dialect spellings ("Shure," "Och," "Oi")—are shown in a kitchen preparing dough. The joke plays on a double meaning: while they discuss making bread dough rise, the final panel shows an explosion, suggesting the dough (or their efforts) literally "rose" violently. This appears to reference fears about Irish immigrants and anarchist/radical activity popular in late 19th-century American satire. The cartoon mocks both Irish accents and, implicitly, anti-immigrant anxieties about dangerous foreign elements in American households.