Judge — March 17, 1900 — page 20: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This satirical cartoon tracks wealth across three centuries using parallel vignettes. In 1700, a man laboriously builds fortune (shown paving roads, traveling, working). By 1800, his descendant squanders it frivolously. The 1900 panel shows "!!!!"—suggesting catastrophic consequences, likely poverty or ruin. The joke critiques inherited wealth and generational decline: hard work creates riches, but idle heirs destroy them. Other scenes contrast past and present life (travel, labor, domestic roles, technology like bicycles and rapid transit), emphasizing how modernity changes society. The "possible future" appears to be financial collapse resulting from wasteful present behavior—a morality tale about wealth management that resonated with Judge's upper-middle-class readership circa 1900.