Judge, 1904-01-02 · page 7 of 18
Judge — January 2, 1904 — page 7: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains four separate humorous pieces satirizing early 1900s American life: **"Calendars"** — A poem mocking the glut of free promotional calendars businesses distributed. Companies like insurance firms and health products literally papered homes with almanacs and decorative prints advertising their services. **"The Improved Diary"** — A joke about a patent diary that pre-prints identical daily entries ("Got up, ate breakfast, lunch and dinner, and went to bed") for every date, eliminating the need to actually write anything—satirizing both lazy modern life and advertising's overblown claims. **"Not in His Line"** — A new clerk admits he previously held a political patronage job (unmeritorious government position) and can't adapt to real work—mocking the spoils system where political connections trumped actual ability. **"Her Hope"** and **"Very Bad"** — Brief jokes about social aspiration and marital discord, respectively. The page reflects Gilded Age anxieties: commercialism's invasion of homes, political corruption, and evolving social expectations.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
CALENDARS. PON the table, on the floor, In all the chairs as well, Are calendars for nineteen four— All that folks give or sell. Here are the same old almanacs With remedies galore For whizzy hearts or aching backs, And lots of micrube lore. The Flashlight Fire Insurance Co., ‘The Oldtine Health and Life, And all the other ones, also, Who seck the premium strife, Have favored me with books and pads And chromos for the wall, Each decorated with their ads.; But still this is not all. Here are the many artists’ “girls,” In colors and in black, With hair in straightest lines or curls, In shirtewaist or in sacque ; And calendars of all the games, And And here's a ca ilroads, stores and boats— aims He ought to have our votes. idate who The Vear of Childhood. Old Age is over there ; Texts, poems, wisdom, weeks of wit, Dog, cat, bird, horse and bear All styles and forms of thing or thought Have been worked up some way, And thus it is that Thave got A year for every day. w. 0. nxsnr. THE IMPROVED DIARY. (A THIS,” explained the bookseller, is our latest pat- ent diary. We think it is the cleverest thing in that line ever devised.” The shopper turns the leaves idly. “But [ can't see where it is different from any other,” she ob- serves, 0? Well, if you will look at all the dates after January 234, you will see that in each space has been printed, Got up, ate break- fast, lunch and dinner, and went to bed.’ That insures a complete diary for the year.” NOT IN HIS LINE. Emptover—" You don't seem to be able to do anything.”* New cLerK “Well, | always had a political job until | struck this one. * HER HOPE. 46VES, mamma,” sighed the fair young thing, raising her limpid eyes to the tender ones of her mother ; yes, mamma, | have set my heart on marrying a nobleman.” Dumfounded, the good woman, her mother, raises her hands and gasps," Lord love you, child! What "—— “That's just what | hope, mamma,” she interrupts ingenuously. VERY BAD. Did yer ever git ketched between de bumpers uv a freight-train 2” Urron Torp—"' Worse'n dat. | got between a man an’ his wife once dat wuz fightin’."” comicbooks.com