Life, 1897-07-01 · page 6 of 20
Life — July 1, 1897 — page 6: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# Analysis of Life Magazine Page 6 This page contains three distinct items: 1. **"Well, They've Got a Big Serve to Put a Thing Like That Is Here"** — A cartoon depicting a rooster, likely satirizing American agricultural or rural practices, though the specific reference is unclear from the image alone. 2. **"Our Fresh-Air Fund"** — A fundraising list for a charitable organization providing outdoor experiences for urban residents, a common Progressive-era cause. 3. **"Very Little Difference"** — A brief comedic exchange about geological studies and soap, playing on words and everyday confusion. 4. **"Brother Abner and the Riddle of Democracy"** — A book review criticizing G.W. Stevens' collection of letters about America's pursuit of wealth ("The Land of the Dollar"), suggesting American materialism and the reader's commentary on American values. The page reflects early 20th-century American social satire and concerns about consumerism.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
OF DEMOCRACY. HE worst thing about Mr. G. W. Steevens’s collection of letters to 3 the London J/ail from America is its The Land of the Dollar” (Dodd, i Mead & Co.). And we have brought that penalty upon ourselves. If our visitors think that the pursuit of the dollar is the sole end of ambition in America, our own newspapers and people are responsible for it. Moreover, Mr. Steevens came over here in the midst of the last campaign to see “WELL, THEY'VE GOT A MIG NERVE TO PUT A THING LIke THAT IN HERE, To What it was like, Of course the chief topic SCARE THE HENS. ULL JUST FIRE IT OUT. OUR FRESH-AIR FUND. Previously acknowledged. In memoriam, Sieg Spingarn. Fort Sill... Clara and Gwendolin Mortimer Stiefel. Ty Ae Beareve Fresh-Air Fund VERY LITTLE DIFFERENCE. es OW are your geological studies progressing, Miss Climely ?” “Very nicely, indeed. I found a lovely piece of rock quartz to-day up on the hill back of the hotel. But, unfortu- nately, I laid it upon my soap dish when I went up to dress, and now | can’t tell which is the soap.” ‘ , Pe of conversation and the whole dramatic quality of the campaign were furnished by the money question, At any rate, if he did come looking for dollars in everything that he saw, he went back home after the election fully convinced that what the Americans were after was a good, big, honest gold dollar. That, as an end of pur- suit, is perhaps better than speculation in Kaffir stocks, or the arduous chase after Ameri- can heiresses. As the author very generously putsit, American respect for the man of dollars is ‘simply respect for the power of doing things that without dollars could not be done.” . ° . F there is too much of the accepted stage and newspaper type of American dollar- chaser in the book, the author has amply atoned for it by seeing a good many good things in the country about which we our- selves are very blind. His most surprising discovery is that the London Common Council ought to be sent to New York to learn ‘‘ how AT THE WELL—LIFE’S FARM, a city should be organized on the material