Judge, 1928-10-13 · page 17 of 36
Judge — October 13, 1928 — page 17: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains a humorous short story illustrated with cartoons about Uncle Harvey's problematic "One-Man Top" buggy. The narrative satirizes both product marketing and human pride. The main joke: Uncle Harvey purchases a buggy with a collapsible top advertised as requiring only one man to operate it. When he tries to demonstrate it to a buyer (Mr. Firp), the top won't lower. Neither man can operate it. They advertise across the countryside searching for "the right man"—the implication being that the product's claim is absurd. The top eventually fails mechanically ("nervous collapse"), solving the problem accidentally. The satire targets turn-of-the-century marketing hype and consumer gullibility. The "One-Man Top" is a pun-laden critique of exaggerated product claims. The secondary cartoon about "calf love" appears unrelated wordplay humor. The author is credited as "Jaquita."
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Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
JUDGE too—well, you can just) imag He said he couldn't s any more, and that was all there was to it. Aunt Abner suggested that since the squeaks were only present when the buggy was going, why didn't he just plain get in and sit, in stead of driving around. So. he tried that, but he said it didn’t take him long to see that that wouldn't get him any place. Well, what finally happened was. that Uncle Harvey's buggy got to be 1 regular buggyboo to him, and at last he determined to sell it. One- Man Top and all. He found a buyer, all right 1 gentleman named Mr, Firp, who had such Filmore lways wanted just a top, for some son or other, nobody asked . But just as the transaction was about to be made, and Uncle Har- vey was going to demonstrate the top for Mr. Firp, why what should) happen but the — top wouldn't put down! And_ it dawned on Uncle Harvey then, all of a sudden, that he had always had it up, and never had even tried to put it down yet at all, ind that while it might be a one- man top, all right, he was not the man! Well, then it occurred to Mr. Firp that maybe he was, but no, when he tried, he couldn't put (GLE “Calf love, Mr. McGuffy? But she hasn't any calves!” it down either. So then they ad- vertised around the village, and finally all over the countryside, trying to find the right man to put down the One-Man Top, for by this time Uncle Harvey was feel ing very humiliated, realizing how very presumptuous of him it had been, indeed, to think that, what with one hundred million Amer- icans, more or less, besides him- self, and gosh only knows. hox many more hundred million other people in the rest of the world, he should be the one man his One Man Top would be won by. Well, for a while things looked pretty black, because as soon as Mr. Firp saw that the top wasn’t going to come down, why he got his mind set on a top-down bug gy or no buggy at all, and it looked as though poor Uncle Har- vey was going to have his buggy- bear on his hands foreve But everything turned out all O. K., because the strain of all the excitement finally got to be too much for the top, and it had « nervous collapse, all by itself. So you can imagine how every one cheered ay Mr. Firp, waving and smiling, drove off in triumph beit with some difficulty, as Uncle Harvey had refused to sell Finley too, and that was the end of the incident of the One-Man Top, which Unele Harvey declared, now that it had been topped off in such a satisfactory manner, had really been a topping adventure. —JaQuita comicbooks.com