Judge, 1924-03-29 · page 5 of 36
Judge — March 29, 1924 — page 5: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# Analysis of Judge Magazine Page This page satirizes the New York telephone system's ambulance service. The left column presents a comedic dialogue where a frantic caller repeatedly demands "an ambulance" to the operator, who struggles to understand what he wants—mishearing requests for police, fire department service, or clarification on vehicle type. The top cartoon depicts the caller's frustration as he attempts to communicate with an indifferent operator and telephone company staff. The bottom illustration, captioned "A believer in signs," shows someone literally interpreting a subway sign's instruction to "Come out of the tube and step out on the street"—emerging from underground with debris flying. The satire targets both the telephone operator's poor service and the public's confusion with city infrastructure and communication systems.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
“lL WANT—” CComparativens recently there has appeared on the cover of New York telephone directories the fol- lowing “T Want an Ambul; “T Want a Police “T Want to Report a Fire.” Thave not yet had the occasion to need a policeman or an ambulance or to report a fire. E hope T never shall. Should I, sometime, for example, feel the lack of an ambulance and, acting under instructions, speak dis- tinctly into the mouthpiece of my telephone, the following conversation is not unlikely Myself (somewhat excitedly)—I want an ambulance.” Operator (with audible intake of breath)—An ambuls i Myself -Yes—T ant an ambu- lance. Operator—Hold the wire. (indicating according to es- a lapse of time.) Myself —Hello, hello, hello! Strange Voice—Ves, ves—hold your shirt, can’t you? Myself —Well—er—er—1 could of course but it would be rather em- barrassing—you see I'm in the lobby of the Voice—Well, what do you want anyway? Myself— want an ambulance. Voice—Why didn't you say so? what kind of an ambulance do you “This hurts me more than it does you, but I belong to the ‘Society want—motor or horse n? for the Suppression of Fresh Office Boys’—and I must do my duty—” that’s what I want—quick—hurry can’t you sce it’s a matter of life and death- Voice—May be you want a hearse. Myself—No, no—this is an emer- gency. Vi —Oh, IT see. Tl give you our emergency department. Another Voice—Mr. Jones speak- ing Myself—1 want an ambulance. Mr. Jones—1 dow't know why they gave you this extension—this is the tment—hold the wire and TH get you the Sales Division— Third Voice—Sales Division—Mr. Woods speaking Myself (frantically)—T want an ambulance, Mr. Woods—Yes, sir—what size? Myself—Size doesn’t matter Mr. Woods—But it does—con- siderably in fact. For example our No. 8A model with four doors, auto- A believer in signs. (Continued on page 29) comicbooks.com