Life, 1895-06-13 · page 5 of 16
Life — June 13, 1895 — page 5: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# Analysis of Life Magazine Page 387 **Left cartoon:** "The One Advantage of a New York Tenement" depicts a tall, cramped tenement building labeled "Himalaya Flats—Tallest Building Erected in New York." The satirical "advantage" is stated below: tenants can remain indoors during hot weather by moving to upper floors "in the region of perpetual snow." This mocks both the absurd height of new construction and the sweltering conditions of tenement living. **Right illustration:** "Rice!" shows what appears to be a domestic scene with adults and a child, accompanying an article titled "Keep on the Grass." The text discusses a new Central Park rule allowing children to play on grass—previously forbidden. The article humorously recounts how a Park Commissioner discovered common plants growing there, treating this as a revelation about natural vegetation. Both pieces satirize New York City's urban conditions and bureaucratic absurdities.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
“cet KEEP ON THE GRASS. TT" history of the origin of the new rule, whereby little children are now allowed to play with impunity upon the grass in Central Park, is involved in some obscurity, but it is supposed to have been as follows: One of the Park Commissioners, while on a visit in Brooklyn, discovered a large tract of land called Prospect Park, which was covered with a luxurious growth of the common anthoraxanthum odoratum, agrostis vulgarts,and other mixed specimens of the indigenous plant more often referred to as grass. His won- dering eyes gazed upon the multitudes of children tumbling about on this unrestricted region of freedom without reserve and confronted by no forbidding signs. Quickly kneeling upon the tufted lawn, he uttered a glad cry as he discovered that this was the same grass that flourished in Central Park. Swiftly beating a retreat, he turned his face toward the metropolis, reaching it by easy stages after several days’ jour- neying in the wilderness, and imparted the joyful news to his constituents that grass could be romped upon and trampled under the feet of the children of the poor and even those of a larger growth, without permanent injury. Thus came about the new order of things. LIFE rejoices that fate directed the footsteps of this dis- coverer of modern times toward even the remote regions of Prospect Park. Had he journeyed toward Philadelphia there would have been a fresh surprise in the fact that the chil- dren had been playing from remote times on the grass at THE ONE ADVANTAGE OF A NEW YORK . 8 ur . Fremont Park, and without injury to it. TENEMENT. TENANTS CAN REM. IN TOWN IN HOT WEATHER BY MOVING TO THE UPPER FLOORS, WHICH ARE IN THE REGION OF PER- HE hydra-headed monster of corruption may have lost PETUAL SNOW, a head or two, but evidently there are others. comicbooks.com