Judge, 1902-12-06 · page 7 of 16
Judge — December 6, 1902 — page 7: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
**Top Section ("The Automatic Referee"):** Three technical drawings mock boxing as a "manly art" by depicting increasingly absurd mechanical referee contraptions. This satirizes efforts to legitimize and regulate boxing, then a controversial sport seeking respectability. **Middle Dialogue:** A conversation between a committee chairman and a "cannibal king" satirizes American attitudes about marriage and divorce. The joke: Americans will welcome a foreigner with multiple wives but no divorces, yet society simultaneously obsesses over divorce scandals. This reflects Progressive-era anxieties about changing marriage norms and American hypocrisy regarding morality. **Bottom Cartoon ("No Equal"):** A football joke where a wife is compared to a "drop-kicker" (scoring technique) because she "drops too much"—likely referencing alcohol consumption or spending habits. **"Twisted" Section:** References the Fates from Greek mythology commenting on an automobile accident as "twisted destiny"—contemporary satire of newfangled automobiles and modern dangers. The page targets American social pretensions, marital instability, and early 20th-century modernization anxieties.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
THE AUTOMATIC REFEREE—FOR THE ELEVATION OF THE MANLY ART. ‘6[NDEED,” says the chair- man of the committee on invitation to the cannibal king who is being urged to visit this country, “you will be very en- thusiastically received in America.” “But,” is the somewhat dubious reply, “it will be no time until it becomes known there that I have four hundred wives.” “What of that?" retorts the chairman. * That will only make you sure of an open- armed weleéme from society.” “ Yet,” continues the can- nibal king, “I never have had any divorces.” However, the urgent chairman succeeds in convincing the royal personage that society is always ready to forgive any little idiosyncrasy “Ui Jones (at the foosball Surrm—"' My wile, wl twist straight. NO EQUAL. ime)—'* Who Is the best drop-kicker you ever saw?" en I take a drop too much.”” on the part of a visiting for- cigner, and that no doubt he can make his hold on America all the stronger by announcing that he has decided to adopt the South Dakota variety of divorce as the only correct mode for his realm. After that there was noth- ing to do but to coach the king in rear-platform etiquette. ‘TWISTED. LACHESIS had gotten the thread of destiny into a knot. “What does it signify?” inquired Clotho. “ Automobile accident,” replied the sister-fate as she jerked the And Atropos, smiling, hung up her scissors. . 1a 3 \\ \ N comicbooks.com