Judge, 1920-02-14 · page 9 of 44
Judge — February 14, 1920 — page 9: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# Winter Days: A Turn-of-the-Century Complaint This is an illustrated humorous essay by Walt Mason about winter hardships, with a cartoon caption showing two well-dressed men riding uncomfortably on an open water wagon through snow. **The Satire:** Mason complains that winter forces everyone—rich and poor alike—onto the same inadequate "water wagon" (a municipal supply vehicle), eliminating class distinctions. The cartoon illustrates this democratic misery: two gentlemen in top hats must endure the cold, jolting ride together. **The Social Commentary:** The essay catalogs winter's indignities across social classes—businessmen losing customers and profits, sick customers trapped at home, police officers suffering chilblains—all united in winter's "total loss." The irony is that wealth normally separates people, but winter's hardships are inescapably universal. **For Modern Readers:** This reflects pre-modern winter conditions when there was no central heating, when commerce literally froze, and when basic transportation (water delivery wagons) was uncomfortable and exposed to elements. The "cheap mail order" snow and grumbling tone capture period complaints about unavoidable winter suffering.
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Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
“Tue Water Wacon’s Corp axp Break, on Wiicn We Have to Rive” Winte r Days By War Masox Illustration by HE blasts from polar regions blow, the fiercest blast you'll find; the ground outdoors is white with snow, the cheap mail order kind. There are no birds among the trees, to southern climes they've flown; and I’ve rheumatics in my knees, and here I sit and groan, My wife would have me shovel snow from off the cheap-johr walks; but [ refuse; I'd like to go and plant potato stalks I'd like to hoe a row of peas and in the garden toil; on frozen snowy days like these I yearn to till the soil. And on the golden summer day, when balmy zephyrs blow, I think I'd give a bale of hay if I might shovel snow All day the bitter tempests shrick, they will not be denied the water wagon's cold and bleak, on which we have to ride ‘Time was when mortal man might choose the cart in which he jaunt, might name the vehicle he'd use, to fill a long-felt want If he possessed a roll of kale, his options loomed up big, and to the poorhouse he might sail, in any kind of rig. The privilege is his no more, he’s scen his options slide; the water wagon’s at the door, and on it he must ride. The water wagon has no top, no stove to keep it warm; devoid of springs, it goes kertlop. through all the wintry storm Rateu Barton The business man takes in no buck. he chews his whiskeriness and thinks it quite a slice of luck to sell a can of beans. He must maintain the whole blamed works until the winter's gone; he has to pay his giddy clerks, who sit around and yawn. He has to burn all kinds of coal to keep his storeroom warm; he waits, and waits, and not a soul comes dritting from the storm. His customers are all at home, consuming coal and wood, and quot ing many a pagan pome set down by authors stewed. And the business man, says he, “The winter is a frost, and spring time is the stulf for me, regardless of its cost! The customer, who stays at hom cling pretty sick, : sorrow rests upon his dome, some fourteen inches thick. He'd like to journey to the store and buy a can of soup, but winter yammers at the door with loud and frantic whoop. He claws around for chunks of oak to feed the sickly blaze; his spirit bends beneath the yoke, he cusses wintry days The peeler on his lonely beat, is murmuring, “Alack!"? For he has chilblains in his fect, and ice all down his back. And if he pinches Richard Roe, and punches Richard’s eyes, and runs him in, amid the snow, it’s just for exercise! The winter is a total loss, wherein no mortals sing; and so I plan to come across with sundry odes to spring Fd a ! ae: comicbooks.com