Judge, 1919-02-22 · page 9 of 32
Judge — February 22, 1919 — page 9: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# "A Trifle" - Judge Magazine Satire This satirical piece mocks the penny-pinching complaints of the working and middle classes during a period of economic strain (likely early 20th century, given the subway setting and penny slots). A woman loses a penny in a defective vending machine and launches into an increasingly absurd monologue about the principle of the matter—how "saved pennies make dollars" and how this petty fraud represents larger societal corruption. She complains to the station attendant, blames the subway authority, and spirals into broader grievances about fraud, weighing machines, and prophecies. The satire targets her obsessive focus on a trivial loss while simultaneously lamenting her tight finances and society's moral decline. The joke is that she's so consumed by this one cent that she nearly misses her train—the mountain made from a molehill. The accompanying brief comic dialogue about a man proposing marriage only after getting out of jail adds a secondary layer of dark humor about desperation.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
wa by Catv ent SMirH EACHING “OLp A Trifle By JL HE small, keen-eyed, wiry looking lady of middle ge waiting for her train in the subway stepped up to the penny-in-the-slot_ machine and in- spected the list of contents it was willing to eject from its mysterious interior for a cent. After due reflection the lady decided upon a piece of checolate. She put her penny in the slot but nothing came forth. She shook the machine and made an ineffectual effort to thrust her finger far into its interior in pursuit of the evasive chocolate. Then she turned to the interested group of bystanders and asked: “Why don’t it come out?” “They often act that way,” volunteered a woman who added that she had been “stung” in a similar fashion and that the Mayor of the city or the Governor of the state ought to “stop such frauds.” “Well, some one ought to,” said the lady who had been separated from her copper without securing any return. “Of course a cent is only a trifle, but in these days with the cost of living so high and all demands heavy even a cent ain't to be sneezed at, and—I have shaken and shaken it but nothing comes out. It’s my opinion that there isn’t now nor ever has been anything in the machine to come out! It’s the fourth or fifth time I have been robbed by machines of this kind and I think that—of course a penny is only a trifle, but it is the saved pennies that make the dollar, and I—here, you, Mr. Station Man, why doesn’t this thing work as it should? ,7 You have nothing to do with it? Well, 1 should think the AN Hannour so why JK. Burays “Yea, “Are you fond of indoor sports, f they know when to go Doc” New Tricks subway ought to be responsible for machines it allows in it to deprive people of their money with no return! Who is responsible if the subway isn’t? Yes, and my sister-in-law was telling me that the other day she put a whole nickel in the slot machine and not a thing came out and—it’s no use shaking the thing, Mister I don’t believe that there is anything in it and if I—of course a penny is only a trifle, but I was brought up to know that—what is that, lady? Try poking a hair-pin into the slot? You can do most anything with a hair- pin, but I don’t believe that—no, it’s no use. I didn’t think it would be and—it’s just like those weighing machines. One day I put a penny into one of them and the hand never budged an inch, not even when | jumped up and down on it, and here is another case of the same kind of fraud! It isn’t the loss of the penny I mind so much as it is the principle of the thing, and if there is anything I hate it is to be deliberately cheated! A penny will neither make nor break me. I was reading the other day of what an age of fraud and deceit this is and they say it is all in harmony with prophecies made thousands of years ago and I think that—there comes my train and I suppose that- of course it is only a trifle but— they'll know it when I drop a penny into another one of their humbug machine: It’s only a trifle, but—wait a minute! Don’t close the car door until—my soul and body! It’s as much as one’s life is worth to try to get into one of these cars these days!” His Only Hope of Getting It Billy—So you refuse to marry me until Iam rich? Milly—Absolutely. Billy—And_ will you wait me until I—until I get out of jail again? for Miss Mabel?” comicbooks.com