Judge — July 3, 1926 — page 35: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This is a reader-participation contest page, not a political cartoon. Judge magazine invited readers to complete an unfinished comic strip for a $25 prize, with the winning entry to be published. The three completed panels show a small man in a hat mining or digging with a pickaxe in a desert landscape. The sequence depicts him swinging the tool, then apparently striking something that causes his hat to fly off. The final panel (blank) is where readers were to draw their comedic conclusion. The humor relies on slapstick physical comedy—a common genre for early 20th-century comics. The contest excludes professional artists, encouraging amateur participation based on "originality of idea, humor, and cleverness." This democratization of comic creation was typical of Judge's interactive approach to engaging its readership during this era.