Judge, 1914-06-20 · page 6 of 24
Judge — June 20, 1914 — page 6: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This 1914 Judge magazine page satirizes industrial-age efficiency obsession. Author Horace Dodd Gastit proposes a humorous "solution" to urban energy waste: installing mechanical chin rests on trolley cars that would harness the jaw-motion energy of chewing-gum-chewing passengers via hidden dynamos beneath seats, converting this wasted kinetic energy into electrical power. The satire targets the era's obsession with extracting maximum productivity from everyday activities—a backlash against the mechanical efficiency movement gaining prominence in factories and cities. By proposing to literally harvest energy from passengers' mindless chewing, Gastit mocks how far rationalization logic could extend. The accompanying illustration and "Steadfast" dialogue joke about marital relationships and aging, likely filler content typical of Judge's mixed editorial format. The top illustration appears decorative, depicting carefree summer leisure—ironic contrast to the letter's mechanistic worldview.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
ch IN A SUMMER SEA ceAs se ee a me OL . Open Letters to Whom They May Concern By HORACE DODD GASTIT (To the Managers of Any Trolley Line, Anywhere) New York, June 15th, 1914. GENTLEM EN—As a constant consumer and well-wisher of your esteemed service, I beg leave to submit herewith a sugges- tion bearing upon a possible economy in the cost of power used by your lines in the run- ning of your cars, You have probably your- selves observed, as I have, that of late years, as one sits on the ample divans provided by you for the comfort of your patrons, one is confronted on the other side of the car by a long line of travelers, who are whiling away the tedious hours of their progress, either up or down town, with a per- petual movement of their mas- ticating apparatus, the inspir- ing cause of which is a choice variety of chewing gum, ob- tained from the ever-accom- modating penny - in- the - slot machines, placed at conven- ient intervals about the city. Now, it has always seemed to me to be a great pity that the power to be derived from this never-ceasing use of the human jaw should be allowed to go to waste; and after many hours of anxious thought upon the possi- bilities of extracting a useful by-product from it, it has occurred to me that this STEADFAST Mrs. Smite—Of course he will. of Sair already. Mrs, Light—1 wonder if my husband will love me when my hair is gray? M He has loved you through three shades wasted energy might be conserved for your use, if you would place at the side of each seat in your cars a small metal shaft to which there could be af- fixed an adjustable, softly cushioned chin rest, wherein the traveler’s lower jaw could be inserted, and the dissipated energy derived from its cease- less activity be thus automati- cally diverted to the driving wheel of a small dynamo, concealed beneath the seat, and thence transformed into electric power for the run- ning of your cars. When you consider that in the city of New York alone probably four million passen- gers are carried every day by electric power, seventy-five per cent. of whom are expert practitioners of the art of chewing gum, you will readily perceive on the most super- ficial examination how much energy is really expended every day to no materially useful purpose. Speaking roughly, I should say that in the course of a ride from Brooklyn to Harlem on the subway, enough of this power is squandered by an average trainload of people comicbooks.com