Judge, 1918-06-15 · page 11 of 36
Judge — June 15, 1918 — page 11: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains two separate humorous pieces mocking modern inconveniences. **"The Train-Announcer"** (top) satirizes railroad station announcers whose incomprehensible public-address announcements were apparently a widespread frustration. The satire pretends their garbled utterances ("Bipxz-r-r-r-xyz-nowreddyntrackfour") are actually sophisticated poetry in Sanskrit or ancient languages, mocking both the announcers' poor diction and passengers' inability to understand train information. The joke: if you're slightly deaf, at least you won't miss your train. The accompanying illustration shows a man proposing to a woman, inaudible even at close range. **"The Struggle for Existence"** (bottom) philosophically muses that humans naturally assume the worst is behind them and good times await, though life is actually difficult. The accompanying illustration depicts an uncomfortable camping setup with tent, machinery, and various contraptions for forced-air heating and clothes drying—technology meant to improve camp comfort but appearing cumbersome and impractical instead. Both pieces gently mock modern technology's failure to deliver promised convenience.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
The Train- Announcer By Harry H. Cratcte TRAIN - AN- NOUNCER is a much mi: understood individ- ual. His is indeed a much-abused calling —of stations. But those un- couth, unintelligible, inarticulate §mouth- ings which are his wont when properly warmed up to his work are, if you must know, merely an evidence of your own abysmal igno- rance. What he is really reciting through his megaphone, and which sounds to your uneducated ear like a cross-section of a buzz-saw and an asthmatic phonograph, is probably a poem from the Sanskrit, or some delicate strophe from the Syro-Chaldaic poets. It goes-something like this: “ Bipxz-r-r-r-xyz-nowreddyntrackfour” but it is not his fault if you need an interpreter to tell you what he is saying. Paraphrasing the immortal words of a contemporary —I think we may call it the RRR of NG—“ Your Pro- gramme is Your Timetable,” and about as useful to you as a menu-card @ la Francaise is to a deaf-mute with an intensive appetite for ham and eggs. For your time- table is really your key to the cryptic utterances of the Drawn by Barxspace Rocers Drawn by Artuur T. Merrick Tom—And he whispered his Train - Announcer — and nobody is sup- posed to understand either. Under the hyp- notic spell of his abe tle eloquence you do not miss your train— until it has pulled out, and someiimes not then. If you are slightly deaf it adds to your enjoy- ment of the occasion, or you can make a game of it, as some do, by utiliz- ing an opera-glass in an effort at lip- reading. But if you are wise, at the first sound of his prelim- inary wind-up you will hunt up that train of yours by main force—and the devil take the hindmost. Delays are dangerous. roposal to her? Gervice—Yes—but not quite low enough. She heard it! The Struggle for Existence EVERYBODY is anxious to keep on living, because nobody realizes how much trouble will have to be overcome along the diversified avenue of existence. At each given moment, there is a strong impulse in all of us to think that the worst is over and that the future holds in store a plethora of milk, honey, myrrh and other choice titbits, all garlanded with roses and set forth ina shady bower. The prophecy of happiness is persistent. ’Tis a wise provision in nature that makes the future of a normal foxes being look better than his past. Wuy Be UncomrortaBie 1n Camp? The new forced-draft, hot air, pneumatic mattress and clothes drying system