Life, 1902-11-13 · page 5 of 22
Life — November 13, 1902 — page 5: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
The central image is titled "Portrait of a Gentleman" and depicts a bloated figure labeled with terms like "Oil Trust," "Coal," and "Over Capitalization." This appears to be a Gilded Age satirical attack on industrial monopolists and corrupt capitalists who accumulated excessive wealth through trusts and overcapitalization schemes. The cartoon criticizes wealthy industrialists for their predatory business practices. The grotesque proportions suggest moral corruption accompanying financial excess. The specific labels reference actual business abuses of the era—oil and coal trusts that dominated American markets through anticompetitive practices, and financial manipulation through inflated capitalization. This reflects Progressive Era anxieties about unchecked corporate power and wealth inequality, likely from the early 1900s.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
Rapid Transit. A. THING of billions, bonds and loans, Of rocks and stocks and sticks and stones, Is the Tunnel. At home, or strolling in the street, Seismic tremors trip your feet— It's the Tunnel. A missile meets your head ; you start. What is this falling on you? Part Of the Tunnel. A thing of blasts in thunder tones To shake you up and grind your bones Is the Tunnel. Besieged for time, you seek to cross The way. But hold! A yawning fosse— The Tunnel. Wild eyed, the block above you try. But no, it's barricaded high At the Tunnel. A thing of mud and dirt and dust To stir the depths of a deep disgust Is the Tunnel. ‘The town is like a mining camp, Defiled by fever, chills and damp, From its Tunnel. And when it’s done, do you suppose You'll find an end to all your woes In the Tunnel? Not so, At dawn or dusk of day You'll find it sprinting on its way To the Tunnel— * LIFE : The courteous crowd, with its wonted rush ; And you'll be engulfed in the crunch and crush At the Tunnel. While they seize seats with a soulless smile, You'll clutch your strap in familiar style Through the Tunnel. And you'll fi ning gait, The usual twenty minutes late, ‘Spite the Tunuel. M. W. Pool, 1 you are, with your light- War. MABTINETS of the regular army may be troubled over the State troops quitting the manoeuvres at Fort Leavenworth because it rained, but we who are more en rapport with the zeitgeist (to fall into three languages at once) are quite undismayed. The tendency of civilization is to * divest war of its horrors, leaving noth- ing but the glory. This means that the time is coming when only barbar- ous peoples will kill one another in nasty weather, while civilized war- fare awaits fair skies. Naturally, the prejudices of profes- sional soldiers interveno to keep car- nage and butchery the messy things they have hitherto been, but preju- dices will have to yield. PORTRAIT oF A GENTLEMAN. Tourtet: ongaT HEAVENS! CAN THI8 RE MEAL, OR 18 IF ONLY MY IMAGINATION? WELL, IP IT ISN'T REAL,IT WILL BE A NO EXAMPLE OP A MAN BRING CARRIED AWAY BY MIS IMAGINATION. . Our Personal Column. MARE HANNA is to publish soon ~Y4 4 volume of reasons why he doesn't want to be President. It will be bound in old gold, and all the pages will be blank, It is privately understood that Conan Doyle was knighted on consideration that he would write no more Sherlock Holmes stories, Even the nobility has its uses. Chauncey Depew was at a dinner the other night and remained silent. It was the hit of the evening. TP HE boy brags of what he will do when a man; when he becomes aman he boasts of what he did when a boy. Love and Janus. ORE day Love came to the Temple of Janus, There saw he the great bronze image of the god, with his two faces, one looking forward and one backward. “Tam like thee,” said Love. “*How may that be?” said Junus. ** Because,” said Love, ‘I am ever looking backward to the joys of Mem- ory, or forward to the joys of Antici- pation.” Carolyn Wells. comicbooks.com