Judge, 1915-11-20 · page 10 of 28
Judge — November 20, 1915 — page 10: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This Judge magazine page satirizes **tour groups visiting the U.S. Bureau of Engraving and Printing** (likely in Washington, D.C.). The main humor comes from a gossipy woman asking absurdly naive questions about money production to a tour guide. The satire targets: 1. **Public ignorance**: Questions about fiber in bills, whether counterfeit money is made there, and whether workers are paid per bill reflect comical misconceptions. 2. **Labor exploitation**: References to congressmen demanding 10% of workers' wages as graft, and women forbidden to wear stockings (to prevent theft) critique poor working conditions. 3. **Wealth inequality**: The woman questions why billions sit locked in vaults while poor people struggle. The small joke at top ("Alimony Club" = "Peace Society") puns on divorce settlements. The page demonstrates Judge's populist satirical approach—mocking both tourist ignorance and genuine workplace abuses in federal facilities.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
Belle—I hear that Bobbie is a member of a Peace-Society! June—Yes. He has just joined the Alimony Club. making a mistake and who has been doing it for sixty-five years? My husband's cousin saw her and she said she never saw anything like the way she counted sheets of money. She said she seemed to be a human machine and I should think she would be. I wouldn’t blame her if she grabbed up a million or two some day and lit out for Canada with it. It wouldn’t be any too much pay for spending sixty-five years in this place. What’s that green stuff some of them have got daubed on them?” “It is the coloring for the money. You know that bankbills are green and that——”” “I know that they are and I have some- times wondered why they didn’t make them blue or pink or purple for a change now and then and why don’t they make the little shinplasters they used to make? I think that they would be easier to carry than so much silver. Who puts in what they call fibre hairs into the bills? My husband's cousin said that there was a red fibre hair running here and there in all bankbills and that if you got hold of a bill without a fibre hair in it you would know that it was a counterfeit. Sofme one told her that this fibre hair was real human hair dyed red, but I have heard it was hair from the tails of white horses dyed red. Which is it? And does one person work it into all of the bills as akind of a finishing touch? I should think that it would be an awful teejus job. And ‘ [ should think that you would get awful tired showing folks through here ev'ry day and answering all of their silly questions. My husband's cousin said that she heard one woman ask the guide that showed them through if it was true that lots of the bills made here was counterfeit and if it was true that the women working here were not allowed to wear stockings while at work for fearthat they would slip bills into them. IfI didn’t have no more sense than that I would stay at home and hide my ig- norance. It wouldn’t be decent of President Wilson to compel three or four thousand women to work with their legs bare! Do they work by the piece or by the day? I have heard that the only way you could get a job here was to agree to give the Congressman that got you the job ten per cent of your pay. I call it mighty small business for a Congressman with the big pay he gets coming that kind of graft on poor working girls and using the money to splurge on. It does seem as if there ought to be plenty of money for ev'ry one with all the money there is here. I’ve heard that they keep hundreds of billions of it locked up in the vaults here. Scems to me it would be better to let poor folks have it. What good does it do locked up here? Where do they make the money for Vermont? That is the state come from. Can’t they work without getting so much ink smeared on them? And this smell! Seems to me they might spray the room with citronella or something to take away the smell. What are those girls doing over there? Poor things! they look all fagged out! And are they going to segger- gate the black from the white workers in this building? I don’t believe in that and I'd as soon as not tell the President so. Is it true that all old and worn-out money is sent here to be masticated? And is it masticated by machinery, or do some of these girls have to do it like the Eskimo women chew skins? Got a cold, ain’t you? You cough ev’ry now and then as if you had.” The Brute I STUDIED rhythm, rhyme and feet, I put Pegasus to the spur; To crisp iambics sought to tell How very much I thought of her. 1 wrote, tore up, then wrote some more. Until my head was in a whirl; Her name I could not rhyme, ‘twas plain, And so T found another gitl.—W'ill Herbert The Poor Simp! “This fellow in the strait-jacket?” “Oh, he was about to perfect an efficiency system that would have made it impossible for any business man to get tired.” “So they said he was crazy —' “Of course! There has to be some ex- cuse for these girl shows, hasn’t there?” Innovation “Bliffins has a scheme for getting rich. Says it’s sure to work.” “Well, it will do more than he ever did.”