Judge, 1932-04-02 · page 13 of 36
Judge — April 2, 1932 — page 13: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# Analysis of Judge Magazine Page This page contains three distinct humor pieces satirizing early 20th-century American life: **"Triolet on a Calm Front Page"** mocks readers' morbid newspaper appetite. The poem, attributed to Margaret Fishback, satirizes how people buy papers specifically for sensational crime coverage—murders and suicides—rather than substantive news. A calm news day is presented as disappointing to commuters. **"Revised"** offers three short satirical quips: one about disreputable figures starting comic magazines, another suggesting farmers use the postal service to handle surplus crops (absurd bureaucratic logic), and a third about a woman avoiding installment-plan vacation tours. **"Hold the Wire"** describes pranks in telephone booths—then common public fixtures. The humor involves hiding in booths to startle people, playing with booth lights, and singing into receivers hoping distant people might hear. The accompanying cartoon shows an exasperated adult and child, with the adult asking when the child will mature beyond such play. All three pieces reflect period concerns: sensationalism in media, the novelty and misuse of new technology (telephones), and generational attitudes about proper behavior and growing up.
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Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
Triolet on a Calm Front Page Nora single murder or “ A solitary suicide! What do we buy papers for? Not a single murder or A good calamity To cheer my morning subway ride. Not « single murder or A solitary suicide! —Marcaner Fisipack Revised ive a man a bad name and he'll start a new comic magazine with in store it. If the farmers really want their affairs handled avoid all possibility of a surplus this summer, why don’t they have the postal authorities do it for them? And, Simple Celia has decided not to go on any of these tours that you pay for on the instalment plan. She says it would be just her luck to run “Do you play?” out of money in the middle of the At- “Not yet!” lantic or some place like that. HOLD THE WIRE 7 ov wouldn't deliberately go into a tele- phone booth just to have fun. But once you're there and waiting for your number, you may as well amuse yourself. You can create a little mild) diver- tissement by crouching down on the floor so you can’t be seen from the outside. You may have to stay there for ten or fifteen seconds before you hear footsteps rushing toward the booth, Just as the door is yanked open, jump up and say, Oh, hello. Won't you come in Perhaps you'll be lucky enough to t de luxe booth with a seat and a light that goes on when the door closes. If | you are, you can have some very nice en- | tertainment with little phys’ effort. t : Just sit there and ascert. the exact spot it which the light goes on. Then by mov- ing the door back and forth just a little but with great rapidity, you can obtain a real pretty electrical display. ] Then it’s fun to just whistle or sing ] into the mouthpiece. The reverberation | is quite interesting at times, and there's ilways the possibility that a wire may be open somewhere and you are being heard in some far-off place like Sioux C If after trying all these suggestions you tind that boredom is creeping up on you, you can make it creep away again by pulling the door out of the booth, Some of them come out quite easi —Ep. Spooxrr “All you think about is play. When are you going to grow up?!!” WwW comicbooks.com