Life, 1903-08-20 · page 26 of 32
Life — August 20, 1903 — page 26: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains several satirical pieces typical of early 20th-century Life magazine humor: **"Stepladder Serenade"** is a poem mocking changing beauty standards. The text reveals that "the standard of feminine beauty is changing"—specifically, tall women (five feet eight inches) are "out of fashion" and shorter girls are now preferred. The poem presents a short man's delight that his previously unfashionable stature now makes him attractive to women who previously "looked down" on him. The satire targets the fickleness of fashion and beauty standards. **Other items** include consumer complaints about rising prices, anecdotes about race relations (referencing Booker T. Washington), and domestic humor involving a playwright, a theatrical manager, and apartment-hunting in Boston. The page is primarily **text-based humor and social commentary** rather than visual cartoons. The advertisements at bottom (Wilson Whiskey, Hunter Rye) are standard period advertising. The overall theme addresses economic hardship, class dynamics, and social absurdities of the era.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
if SICCORS AT NLL vs mM yyy) O per cent. tn price The standard of feminine beauty Is chang i : Ten minutes later breakfast foods In prices show a ia uty Is changing Misourl and Mi Reautles of five fect eight are now out of fasuica FROM THE CONSUMER A bouse burns down In Texas and a stove blows up STEPLADDER SERENADE Short girls have come in.—Daily Mail. must follow causes, which is what I most | and eat the How glad 1 hows to hear! thing ever Dappens an: Why, it » my whole career id Chicago Tribi Now Na as it would ap | Is making matdens shorter M tells at tory which The belle of five feet elxbt 1 we the mixed with which the South ner regards Looker T. Washington. An eld Flor colonel recently met Booker T. Washington and io a bibulous burst of confidence said to the negro edueetor Thanks, Nature, thanks! for now, you know ho at my statu to scoff, And [my bigh-beeled boots ean doff, And yet be sure of quarter. Sub, I'm glad to meet you. Always wanted to I need not up a F Ko hake your hand, sub pink, sub, you're the When T would my affection show nan in Americ Or do what Cupid teacte vid Mr, Washington The dimpled darling of my love are, sth,” said the colonel, and*then, pug Who, like to an illusive dove naciously; “Who's greater?” Soared once so far my head above, aid the founder of Tuskegee, “there's No longer out of “On stilts no more my cause TH plead, And I to courtship can proceed. In this assurance stronger That, whatsoever girls may do A wecieKnows theatsieal manager, who. is-dis- When [ henceforth attempt to woo, tingulshed rather for bis business ability than for One course at least they can’t pursue, his knowledge of Uterature, was visited not long They can't ‘look down’ upon me! ago by an aspii playwright. He had with bim, —London Truth he explained manager, the manuscript of a play based o: ar Allan Poe's stortes wate be: Wa nd to make @ senea- Tite head of the family, with his beloved sweet- tonal bit on th 1 bnacnted to driar and bis favorite magazine, had settled back hear the play, and listened with ng Interest in the rocker for a quiet, comt e evening, as the playwright read from his manuseriy On the other side of an intervening tab! He was enthusiastic when the end was reached, the min e erpart of himself, the wrinkling ' ie That's fine! he e ed—" Now Il of whose e r-old forehead Indicated that eeus PEEPLES tell you what I'll ¢ and Mr. Poe come in Was mentally wrestling with some perplexing pr A. Weelear ‘ ; cumulative tomorrow and we'll talk this thing over.” lem. After a while he looked toward bis co on i —Harpere Weck'y. loving parent, and, with a hopeless inftect! asked Buss Canaan, the poet, tells of a young friend “P of his who was cceking apartments in Boston's aris- “Yes, my on." tocratic section, Beacon Hill, At one house he was “Can the Lord make everything’ received by the landlady, a spinster of uncertain Yes, my boy.” Mosquitoe New Jersey bite a magnate on the age and aggressive refinement of manner. Awed to “Every everything?” wing— . the lady's manner, tho rather ‘There Is nothing, my son, that He cannot do.” ult: The poor consumer feels that flerce mos- nervous young man stammered: “And would it be Papa, could He make a clock that would strike quito’s sting possible for me to secure apartments in your house, tess than one The skecter’s song is silenced, but in something like = Mre. Blan! whereupon the spinster held & “Now, Johnny, go right upstalrs to your ma, an hour elf even straighter than before and replicd with» and don't step down here to annoy me when I'm s understand that it requires a ratce in haughty reproof: “Miss Blank, sir! Miss—trom _ reading.”* choice !"—New York Times. Jounny went and wondered still.—Lippincott’s ro the cold Not by a Jug: L used to think co, but he invited you oner [ think he’s a bla coundrel Exchang tab and it you fifty n ke a summer took a It boosted buckleberri¢s up to 20 cents a bex. No matter wha g it always finds your Give us a rest! Let nothing ever happen any more. Lire is for sale by all iers-in Great Britain, The Intern 1 News Company, Bream's Batiding, Chancery Lane, London, E.C., England, AGENTS. Established 1823, | What's in a Name? Like a racer in the chase, far to WILSO the front, and forging ah Hunter WHISKEY, Baltimore That's All! Rye is the leading whiskey of America, THE WILSON DISTILLING CO. . N & SON, Laltimore, son. Distt | WM. LANAHAN & SON, Lalumore, LOS ANGELES—Four Days from New York or Boston—By NEW YORK CENTRAL. comicbooks.com