Judge, 1912-03-09 · page 9 of 24
Judge — March 9, 1912 — page 9: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
The top cartoon depicts a child asking his mother if he's tall enough to reach a package on the mantelpiece. His refusal—claiming it's his cough medicine—is a humorous double meaning: he's implying the medicine tastes so bad he deliberately can't reach it, avoiding taking it. The accompanying article by Ellis Parker Butler is a satirical biography of John Smith (Virginia colony president, 1608-1609), mocking his inflated autobiography and dubious claims. Butler suggests Smith fabricated details to make his story "thrilling and likely to be a best seller," inventing wildly implausible adventures (like the equator tale). The satire specifically targets Smith's famous Pocahontas story as suspect—Butler claims to have studied "eight existing" accounts questioning its authenticity. The piece humorously suggests Smith was more creative fiction-writer than historian, padding dull facts with entertainment value. The bottom comic strip (caption visible) appears to continue this theme of miscommunication or exaggeration.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
Zi, Pip NOT OVERREACHING. “Tommy, are you tall enough to reach that package on the mantelpiece ?"” “ Not if it is my cough medicine.” OHN SMITH, president of the colony of Virginia, 1608-1609, was a mem- ber of the proud and exclusive Smith family, of which only eight million three hundred and forty-four thousand six hundred and thirty-two members were living at eight o'clock last night. He was a descendant of Black Smith, one of the early English iron magnates, whom Longfellow has celebrated in his verse, “Under the spreading chestnut tree.’” Little is known of the life of John Smith except what was written by him- John By ELLIS PARKER BUTLER. self, and this, unfortunately, reads like an autobiography prepared especially for publication in ‘‘The Prominent Citizens of Scott County, Iowa.’’ There seem to be touches of a vivid and untamed imag- ination in John Smith’s autobiography. Whenever he came to a dull spot, he thought up something interesting and put it in, thus making his story thrill- ing and likely to be a best seller. An autobiography of this sort is snappy, but wouldn’t please Mr. Roosevelt. John was too prone to take the cold Smith. facts and wallop the hide off them. He was the sort of man-that could go to church to hear a missionary, and come home and tell his wife he had been to the North Pole and got tangled in the equator there, escaping with his life only by grabbing the equator back of the ears and breaking its neck. For that reason, I, with many other eminent authorities, am inclined to look on his story of Pocahontas with suspi- cion. I have studied the eight existing (Continued on page 19.) IT DON’T TAKE TOMMY’S MOTHER LONG TO PUT TWO AND TWO TOGETHER. comicbooks.com