Judge, 1918-08-17 · page 13 of 32
Judge — August 17, 1918 — page 13: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# Analysis for Modern Readers This page combines humorous aphorisms with satirical commentary on American war narratives. The top section presents witty observations about everyday life (medical procedures, metric systems, marital frustrations). The "Halt!" section critiques a movement for more honest school history textbooks, advocating instead for patriotic mythology. The author argues that Americans have always been taught they were "always right, always ready, always fighting and winning against the heaviest odds"—and questions why this comfortable national narrative should be disrupted with factual accuracy. The cartoon by Dox Herold, "One of the War's Miracles," depicts a figure (likely representing American pride or nationalism) surrounded by stacked "20 Stories" of official accounts, suggesting the towering fictional narratives built around wartime events. The message is ironic: the author defends historical distortion as preferable to uncomfortable truth—a critique of American educational jingoism, likely written during or shortly after World War I.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
How About It? By Kate B. Burros UTTING out the sob stuff!” the doctor said as he removed the patient’s eye. Hell has lost all its terrors since last winter's coal shortag An engineer sometimes overestimates the load a steel girder will carry, just as a small boy does the strength of a safety pin to hold up his nether garments. Smell shock in the street car rush hours is almost as bad as shell shock in the trenches. After looking under the bureau for the collar button, try feeling of the baby’s appendix in order to locate it. In the metric system the gram is the unit of mass. In the editorial system is the epigram the unit of wit? Nothing else approaches the frightfulness of a woman to whose children yours have communicated a contagious disease. A vamp is the part of a shoe from toe to instep which is cut too long and makes your foot sore, or the young lady who is cut just ri es your wife sore. Worm drive appli biles, or an angler < fishir son. rom ‘Bread, cheese and kisses” it is our duty to eliminate the bread, and cheese is so darned expensive. Halt! b the movement for better school histories. recently inaugurated at an educational convention at Indianapolis, altogether sound? It is one of the sacred privileges of the makers of school histories to omit the account of all the mistakes this country has ever madi nd to put a halo around every virtue, real equally well to certain automo- ng bait at the opening of the Oxe or THE War’s Miracres - and this one are the seme My father lef: a fine home and loads of to rub it in, but mine left mea s of War or otherwise. Anything approximating exact truth in narration is distasteful to almost every educator. And in history of course it is very much more important to conceal the truth than it is in any other de- partment. Ifa school biologist distorts the truthin the‘ interests of science” there isa fair chance that later on the pupil may discover the facts for himself. But in history there is no chance, because no- body reads history after he leaves school. From the beginning we have been taught that we were alway right, always ready, always fighting and winning against the heaviest odds. Why, then, at this late date dis- turb our sense of historical serenity Have we not trouble enough in the future without reconstruct- ing the past? comicbooks.com