Judge — February 7, 1903 — page 24: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This is primarily a **whiskey advertisement** rather than political satire. It promotes "Red Top Rye" whiskey from Ferdinand Westheimer & Sons, with distillery operations in Louisville, Kentucky and offices in St. Joseph, Missouri and Cincinnati, Ohio. The advertisement features an Art Deco design with two stylized female figures balanced on an inverted bottle/funnel shape. The image emphasizes the product's purity and quality ("All First Class" and marked "The Emblem" and "Whiskey Purity"). This dates to the Prohibition era or shortly after—the elaborate marketing and emphasis on "first class" quality suggests distillers were competing aggressively to establish brand prestige during or following alcohol restrictions.