Judge, 1918-04-27 · page 10 of 36
Judge — April 27, 1918 — page 10: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This is a satirical cartoon mocking American pacifists during World War I. The image shows a man being launched by sling-shot up a tall building (the Flatiron Building in New York). The joke targets "Willie Bonehead," a pacifist who reads about Germany's long-range artillery bombarding Paris. His nightmare—being violently launched skyward by an American soldier—is meant as dark comedy suggesting pacifists should abandon their opposition to military involvement. The satire's point: pacifism is naïve cowardice; even the threat of America entering the war should convince peaceniks to accept military service ("exchange his spats for a pair of military puttees"). This reflects Judge magazine's interventionist stance during the pre-1917 American debate over entering WWI, ridiculing those opposing U.S. military engagement.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
The Nightmares of a Pacifist--No. 7 Photo composition by Pexntton Maxweut. FTER reading about the big German gun that fired shells into Paris from a distance of seventy-six miles, Willie Bonehead went to bed and dreamed that an American artilleryman playfully hurled him out of a sling-shot from the middle of Madison Square to the top of the Flat-Iron Building. Willie woke up with a determination to exchange his spats for a pair of military puttees. comicbooks.com