Judge, 1924-08-30 · page 9 of 36
Judge — August 30, 1924 — page 9: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# Explanations for Modern Readers **"Hey, Buddy, you've dropped your engine!"** (top cartoon): A slapstick joke about an early automobile breaking down. A man bends over to pick up a detached engine part while his dog watches. The humor relies on the novelty and unreliability of early cars—engines were prone to literally falling apart. **"Came the Dawn"** (center): Satire of silent-film title cards and melodramatic movie writing. A husband writes his absent wife in overwrought, purple prose ("rosy fingered dawn," "weight of desolation"), describing his loneliness. The punchline: when she announces her return, he frantically cleans house instead of remaining poetic. The joke mocks both pretentious movie title-writing and husbands' priorities. **"A Growing Business"** (right): A father-son joke about wildly different moral standards. Father boasts he "sowed wild oats" in youth; son replies the father simply had fewer oats to account for—implying the son's generation is more dissolute. The page demonstrates Judge magazine's mix of automotive-era humor, film industry satire, and generational comedy.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
“Hey, Buddy, you've dropped your enginel” Came the Dawn The Movie Title Writer Writes His Wife in the Country DEAREST — COMES THE ROSY FINGERED DAV PAINTING ANOTHER DA DAY OF LONG HOURS A) SAD SILENCES. NO TRILLING LAUGH TO CHEER THE LONELY HEART, NO FOND CARESS TO SOOTHE THE ACH- ING MIND. ALL, ALL IS DULL AND DREAR. NOR TOIL NOR AUGHT TO LIFT THE PALL OF GLOOM. SINKS THE WESTER- ING SUN BEHIND THE SABLE ROBE OF NIGHT—THE PLAIN- TIVE CALLOF THE WHIP-POOR- WILL FINDS SORROWFUL ECHO IN A HEART WEIGHED WITH THE WEIGHT OF DESO- LATION. (CLOSEUP OF HERO, HEAD BOWED IN HANDS T- ING IN BAI ROOM, A PIC- TURE OF DESPAIR.) One day later DEAREST—ARRIVES A LET- TER. FONDLY HE CRUSH. If TO HIS LIPS. WITH SH ING EYES HE READS HIS NAME IMPRINTED BY THAT DEAR HAND, AN ETCHING ON THE SCROLL OF DESTIN THRILLED AT THE NEWS OF HER HOME COMING HE PLUNGES INTO THE THROES OF CLEANING HOUSE. WEL- COME HOME, LITTLE WOMAN! THE END Nick Flatley Suppressed Desire Would that a harp beyond all dreams For arc the vault of heaven; the divine s for pedestal, that. throne the Nine; And as For strings, the sun's beams falling gold and sheer AUhwart the skies. ‘Then fittingly, my dear, I'd praise you, and I'll tell the world you'd hear S—o—m—e Jazz! Gardner Rea A Growing Business Father—When I was your age, I'd sown all my wild o: Son—That may be, father, but you had a much smaller crop to account for. ‘omes a pause in the day's occupations, That is known as the Children's Hour.” —Longfellow comicbooks.com