Life, 1903-10-08 · page 3 of 20
Life — October 8, 1903 — page 3: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page celebrates the automobile chauffeur as a modern folk hero. The illustration shows a reckless driver in a peaked cap speeding past a tree where a child sits reading—the caption warns "Woodman, spare that tree...I'll protect it now," sarcastically suggesting the chauffeur endangers what nature preserves. The poem "Salut au Chauffeur" (attributed to Walt Whitman) mockingly praises the "festive Red Devil" driver—speeding, crashing, evading police. It's satirizing both the chauffeur's dangerous recklessness and society's romanticization of automobiles as symbols of liberty and modernity, despite their obvious public hazards. The brief "Fame" section continues the joke, noting quarreling chauffeurs make the newspapers regularly.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
“ woopma: ‘Toren » SPARE THAT TREE, TA SINGLE BOUGM, IN YOUTH IT SHELTERED w AND I'LL PROTECT IT Now. Salut au Chauffeur. (Scprosep To Have Bren WRITTEN By Watt Warrmay.) SONG of the automobile! A carol of the festive Red Devil! A yodel of the goggle-eyed chauffeur, sitting aplomb in the midst of devastation A chant of speeds, tires, tonneaus, spark-plugs, poppet-valves, collet-pins, high-clutches, this shall be my morning romanza! See the locomokokomobile scooting through my poem! The waft and aura of gasoline floating through my morning romanza ! The squawk and scatter of chickens, the squeal of the old rooster who didn’t jump quick enough. See! The robust Manhattanese, attired in the usual costume, agile, elusive, profane just at present, getting out of the road for dear life! The impotence of his cuss words! The useless- ness of the protests of the apoplectic old lady ! See! The over-curious calf standing in the middle of the road ; the dog, imprudent, unforeseeing ; the two instantly trans- formed into veal or sausage. Allons, mes enfants!) Whoop! See! The festive chauffeur, rampant, chantant, jubilant, moving the lever to let the speed out another notch! Libertad! See the wagon, the horses rearing and plunging! He is upon them. Crash! That was a good one! The friendly and flowing rustic, where is he? Tam not only the poet of the chauffeur; I do not decline to be the poet of the cop also. See the suburban cop standing, ready to pinch those who break the speed laws! The locomokoko furious arriving, the chauffeur refusing to stop; the jigger, enraged, shooting the tire of the car ; the tire punctured, the Red Devil stopped. See the cop dragging the chauffeur before a police judge; the judge imposing a fine; the chauffeur, reluctant, paying it. Justitia, ma femme, I salute you! I perceive that once in awhile you get there with both feet! Horace B. Matthews. Fame. bs Fro do they get on together? "’ “Famously! They quarrel continually, and their quarrels all get into the newspapers.”’ comicbooks.com