Judge, 1933-01 · page 9 of 36
Judge — January 1933 — page 9: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# Judging the Sports: A Depression-Era Commentary This *Judge* magazine article satirizes American sports during the Great Depression. The author notes that the economic crisis has decimated football attendance—"Ole Man Depression couldn't ante up four bucks"—forcing de-emphasis of the sport. The cartoons humorously depict the violent, physical nature of ice hockey, which the author suggests attracts Broadway's "mob" crowd seeking vicarious thrills from bodily conflict. Named players like Howie Morenz, Aurel Joliat (the "Flying Frenchmen"), Nels Stuart, Eddie Shore, and Ching Johnson are praised for their toughness—particularly Johnson, depicted as a tough, bald veteran who single-handedly stops opponents. The satire contrasts American and Canadian hockey culture, suggesting Canadian fans' passionate (violent) rooting style—"Beer bottles, bricks...and the occasional well aimed 'shiv'"—surpasses American spectators' restraint. The closing joke about surgical supplies heading to Toronto implies the Canadian game's brutality necessitates medical supplies.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
Judge JUDGING THE SPORTS ELL, the football season was good fun V \ while it lasted! We learned many things, chief of which was the fact that Ole Man Depression couldn’t ante up four bucks for the erage gridiron shows. Thus we got our de-emphasis in the direct manner. Californian teams bit the dust not once, but any times. This was very cheering to the st. The Midwest was again the rightful home of nearly all the first class football being played, and the bucko mouthings of Hunk An- son were sweetly smothered by the Pittsburgh and . S.C. trouncing lah! You would think t they'd give our arteries a chance to soften up a bit—our pulses an opportunity to settle back to a lethargic winter throb. But no, right under our nose they open up the indoor Hockey season. Despite the frigidaired mise-en-scéne of it all you just can’t cool off when twelve upholstered demons armed with razor edged skates and hickory sticks are tearing, slashing, and crashing into each other with all the venomous gusto of a squadron of whippet tanks. With the exception of the floating crap games I think lee Hockey attracts more of the Broadway ‘‘mob” than NE TRRIVES ON THE WEAE AND TEAR OF THE Kae CHING DOMASoN TURNS JHEM BACK UNAIDED any other sport. Sunday night at the Garden these days features a diamond horseshoe of its own. A wee bit synthetic perhaps those diamonds, but the furs are there. Some of the “big sho’ ‘an shoot the works on the girl friends as well as the VanAstorbilts and I don’t mean perhaps. Maybe it is the vicarious thrill the ganguys get from watching the bodily con- flict . . . besides, hockey is a swell game to bet on. Of course your New York, Boston and Chicago fan doesn't quite measure up to M’sieu Ana: LeRangue pronto and points North. Those Canuck gallery boys have quaint ideas about rooting. Beer bottles, b and the occasional well aimed “shiv” or stilletto are showered down on the ice with delightful abandon, funny thing about Hockey in the U. S. eem to be able to hold our own with the Canadian colleges. Yale and Dartmouth are right up there on the ice and Harvard has some brilliant traditions and padded pants to fall back upon but the pro game is something quite different. The Canadian pro seems to be a long-li.ed fella. He thrives on the wear and tear of the game. Many of them are World War veterans and if you lifted up some of those queer little caps the players effect dur- ing the game you would find many a bright, shiny dome. Once bitten with the hockey virus it’s mighty hard to s! away from any of the games. On a good night you may see Howie Morenz and Aurel Joliat, the Flying Frenchmen, come storming down the centre alley leaving de- struction in their wake. Sit and shiver as some luckless centre gets sandwiched in be- tween Nels Stuart and Eddie Shore, the bone crushing Boston defense men. And oh! for a ight of Ching Johnson, the daddy of them all, as he crouches there with the lights shining down on that bald pate, gum working a mile a minute, facing the onslaughts of a whole team and turning them back unaided. I saw a load of surgical supplies going down 8th Avenue today. I guess that means Toronto (Page 29, please) comicbooks.com