Judge, 1912-10-12 · page 7 of 28
Judge — October 12, 1912 — page 7: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page from *Judge* satirizes Theodore Roosevelt through absurdist humor. The top cartoon shows a futuristic baseball scoreboard on a skyscraper's rooftop—a joke about how tall buildings will eventually dominate urban life. The main article mocks Roosevelt as "Doctor Roosevelt," a fictional eccentric scientist living in Oyster Bay who has devoted himself to growing oysters through irrigation and breeding children on vines like fruit. The satire targets his recent political actions: his "split" of the Republican Party (likely the 1912 Progressive/Bull Moose Party split) is presented as a singular "masterly stroke," while his vice-presidency is described as an embarrassing "bump" from which he "rallied." The piece uses pretend-serious biographical language to ridicule Roosevelt's conservation efforts and political ambitions, treating his real accomplishments as absurd pseudoscientific pursuits. This was typical *Judge* mockery of prominent public figures of the era.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
an foment 6O02I | A SCOREBOARD FOR SKYSCRAPERS. How in the future the hundred and ninety-fifth story ‘‘ suburbanites '’ will be enabled to follow baseball games from their rerial bleachers. Doctor HAT does he look like? Where does he live? What are his hab- its, his likes and dislikes? These are some of the questions people are asking themselves, in their eagerness to learn something about this quiet but progress- ive young doctor of political extrava- gance, who has just made two parties grow where only one party grew before. Dr. Roosevelt lives in Oyster Bay, Long Island, N. Y. He is of medium height, rather sturdily built and wears glasses. He is virtually a recluse, preferring the peace and solitude of his aK, oyster beds to the habitations of man. He is an earnest conservationist, hav- ing done more than any other man to reclaim the arid oyster, which under a practical system of irrigation is begin- ning to assume the importance of a na- tional resource. A few years ago Dr. Roosevelt was almost unknown, and, added to this, he had the misfortune to bump into the vice-presidency with such force that the rebound hurled him into even greater obscurity. He rallied, however, and it was during his convalescence that an Roosevelt. accident occurred which enabled him to continue his particultural pursuits. He has always been interested in ath- letics, but it was not until recently that he acquired sufficient strength to enable him by one masterly stroke to split the Republican party. Dr. Roosevelt is especially interested in the family tree. His investigations in this field have convinced him that children can be made to grow on vines like huckleberries, and it is said that he will devote the rest of his life to the development of the idea.—iv. F. x. = comicbooks.com