Judge, 1916-11-18 · page 8 of 28
Judge — November 18, 1916 — page 8: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
**"The Trapeze Life"** is a satirical essay by Don Herold mocking the early 20th-century obsession with physical fitness and "natural living." The author proposes that modern civilized life—with its sedentary office workers and fat businessmen—is wrong, and that everyone should instead wear tights, perform acrobatics, and install trapeze sets in their backyards. The humor lies in the absurdity: he imagines catching moving streetcars by doing handsprings and enacting laws requiring acrobatic feats every half-block. The cartoon shows a woman in tights on a trapeze, apparently his reluctant wife. The satire targets the era's faddish health crazes and fitness obsessions, suggesting their advocates are impractical idealists disconnected from reality. **"A Low Percentage"** presents "Dr. Anna List," a child psychologist with no actual baby experience, drafting resolutions for a mothers' organization. The joke critiques experts who theorize about subjects they've never actually encountered—a common target of satirical magazines.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
\T MAY TAKE USA LITTLE WHILE TO GET USED TO TIGHTS, MISS DIMPLE, BUTI THINK WE SHALL FIND THAT THIS IS THE LIFE é THE TRAPEZE LIFE VERYBODY ought to wear tights, and everybody ought E to have a flying trapeze set in his back yard or base. ment. I went to a circus last night, and I am con nced that trapeze life is the reasonable life. The present civilized life is all wrong. Fat, flabby bankers are all wrong. Anemic brain-workers are all wrong. The trapeze life is. the life The peculiar thing about a circus is that we all pay money to sce a few people doing things that everybody ought to be doing. Everybody, for instance, ought to have a horse, and get him out in a ring every afternoon and run him around and jump on his back and ride around standing up. I believe in acrobatics this morning. and I believe in tights. and [am going in for both. First, I am going to get a set of dumb-bells, and then, gradually, I shall work up to horizontal bars, and then to a flying trapeze act. I shall have to get one of the neighbors to go in with me on the flying trapeze work Maybe the man next door and his wife, and | and my wife can get up a team, My wife isn’t as enthusiastic about this new life as [ It will probably be some time before I start coming down to the office in tights—but sooner or later | am going to begin I shall take delight, in the morning, when the street car is half a block past my corner. [ shall run and catch up with it and then spring lightly to the roof of the car. As soon as everybody gets to leading the acrobatic life, the street cars will not need to stop. Here we are, now, going about with broken-down insteps, short-breathed and stupid. We shufile slowly down the strect, puffing and steaming. A lot of fat old business men will look funny in tights, but when I get my law through the legislature that everybody has to turn a handspring every half block, it won't take long to” It is odd that we have to go to a circus and tight wire acts, and tumbling. A The performance is all normal and the It was Barnum’s original idea to Today, the weed out the weak. to see trapeze acts, circus is all reversed. audience is all abnormal. charge the normal a dime to see the abnormal. circus audience should ail be trapeze performers sitting around watching a lot of fat, old, flabby bankers eating oatmeal and cream—sitting out in the middle of the arena eating oatmeal and cream, and playing dominoes. I have written to my mother this morning and told her to make me a suit of tights—my wife laughed at me when I asked her. Mother will be sympathetic. She will come through with a suit of tights by parcel post. I told her I would send a trapeze, if she wanted to make herself a suit while she is making mine—and I'll bet mother takes me up. —Don Herold. A LOW PERCENTAGE ISS ANNA LIST, the well-known lady psychologist, is now hard at work on the plans for the first mecting of the National Council of Mothers of Prize-Winning Babies. In an effort to save em! g and probable fric- tion at this initial gathering, which, she confesses, will be in the near future, Dr. List has drawn up the following resolu. tions. Considering the fact that this famous child expert has had no actual contact with babies, her resolutions show remark- able vision, She plans to have them adopted before the meet- ing is called to disorder. ‘This, she says, is the only psycho- logically sane method of handling resolutions. — Resolved : That babies are human animals. That babies should be fed and bathed regularly or not at all. That babies should not be held or rocked before or after naps or meals That babies should be supplied with a suitable quantity of fresh air three or four times a day. That inexperienced mothers should not cuddle. tumble, toss, squeeze, or roll their babies on full stomachs That all mothers should sce to it that their babies form no bad habits until they are old cnough to know better. With the possible exception of the last two resolutions, Miss List is direct and intelligible, and is to be congratulated. It is to be hoped that her cold, keen mind be given the reins at the coming convention. The per cent. of prize-winning babies is disgracefully low, and it is high time that something be done about it HW. Dee Every time that I see May Brown She seems to be wearing a wedding gown. I'm willin’ to bet an old plugged dime She's livin’ in Reno most of the time. comicbooks.com