Life, 1905-02-02 · page 25 of 40
Life — February 2, 1905 — page 25: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains three satirical pieces typical of early 20th-century American humor: **"The Woes of a Strenuous Spirit"** (main illustration): A ghost complains about being overworked by spiritualist mediums and "Psychic Research Clubs." The satire mocks the era's spiritualism craze—séances, spirit communication, and mediums who claimed to contact the dead. The exhausted ghost's grievance that he's "billed to do stunts" in forty towns simultaneously ridicules both the commercialization of spiritualism and the public's gullible belief in it. Reference to "Minot Savage" (likely a real spiritualist figure) grounds it in contemporary spiritualist culture. **"Remedy"**: A doctor prescribes farming for seasickness—absurdist humor suggesting an obviously wrong solution. **"Complete"** and **"Tit for Tat"**: Brief jokes about matrimony and romantic disappointment, reflecting common satirical themes about marriage as mutually unsatisfying. The spiritualism critique was timely satire during spiritualism's American popularity boom of the 1880s-1920s.
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Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
VALENTINE VOICES. Remedy. “D)ocror, isn’t there anything 1 can do for this seasickne “Why, yes. Try farming. GREAT deal of time is wasted in doing things before they started, and then doing them again after they are done. are over 139 The Woes of a Strenuous Spirit. ‘T was a weary-looking ghost That sat beside my bed. Apparently he was a most Dissatisfied and peevish ghost, And ths was what he said + My duty is to answer calls For ma To nightly visit public halls, To tumble chairs and tap on walls y mediums, And play on horns and drums. “To enter stances and meet With folk Id And when my business they entreat, not know, In spectral whispers I repeat, ‘Lam your brother Jo!" * And when I goto see the Hub There's little rest for me. Some meddling Vsychic Research Club Pegins my character to drub Till I would fain be free. + From Beacon Hill to Panama i'm billed to do my stunts From Steubenville to Omaha, From Maine to Philadelphia— Full forty towns at once. + And Minot Savage oft will look Upon me as a swiper, “In life L was a quiet cuss Who led I fittle thoug That de: The gi aiet life ; it it could be thi h could be so stre ve so full of strif +O Mister, don't you want a spook To work about your home, ‘© mind the door, to help the cook, To Just your hearth a len And haunt you in the gloara ? *O Sir!” he cried—but that was all, For with a He vanished qui To ‘tend a far-off hurry call From some Research Society Wallace Irzvin. \d sobriety Aly through the wall Complete. 7 HAT shall I furnish my cozy corner with?” Cievertos : Ob, any good, desirable, seventeen-year-old blonde. Tit for Tat. “ LJOW did their marriage turn out?" “As usual. Each one succeeded in disappointing the family of the other.” comicbooks.com