Life — August 22, 1895 — page 5: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

# "At Three in the Afternoon" This is a social satire about leisure and nightlife among well-to-do men. The left figure, exhausted and disheveled (holding what appears to be wilted flowers), claims he's "been up all night." His companion, impeccably dressed in formal evening wear with top hat, responds that he's taking a Harlem girl to a theatre party in Brooklyn. The joke reflects 1920s-era attitudes: it satirizes the "society man" lifestyle of staying out late in nightclubs and pursuing women, particularly women from Harlem—then an emerging entertainment district. The contrast between the two men's states (one worn out, one fresh) and their divergent evening plans mocks the exhausting social pretensions of wealthy men trying to maintain an active nightlife. The title's specific time reference emphasizes the absurdity of such "afternoon" conversations about all-night escapades.