Life, 1906-09-06 · page 18 of 40
Life — September 6, 1906 — page 18: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This satirical piece mocks early American history by playfully debunking the Vikings' arrival in North America. The cartoon depicts Vikings abandoning Boston, seeking warmer climates farther north—an absurdist joke inverting geography. The text humorously dismisses Vikings as lacking vision: they found Plymouth Rock and New England uninviting, deeming cranberry cultivation and "ethical culture" beneath them. The satire critiques both the Vikings' supposed incompetence and Americans' reverence for colonial "origins." References to contemporary figures—Randolph Hoist (appears to be a banker/financier) and Lawrence Sullivan (a bridge expert and Massachusetts native)—suggest that American success required modern capitalist backing, not historical accident. The piece lampoons nationalist mythology by suggesting Columbus, not Vikings, "discovered America to stay discovered," implying discovery itself requires proper financial sponsorship and publicity.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
OUR BEGINNING Early Rumors HE vikings left few memorials. The fact that Plymouth Rock, the Berkshire Hills and the Ancient and Honor- able Artillery still remain is held to indicate nothing further than that the Norsemen had an abundance of ballast for their boats, and to be of litt!e or no historical significance. There were no $3 shoes in the market then, the Douglases being detained in Scotland (it is a curious coincidence that the Marquis of Queensberry was a Douglas and that the most noted exponent of his rules for bridge whist, Mr. Lawrence Sullivan, is a product of Massachusetts), and $3 being about their limit, the vikings presently got cold feet. They had no eye for the possibilities. Cranberry culture they deemed beneath them, and ethical culture had not begun to come in yet. Their hopeless density is shown by the fact that whereas they must have got their clearance papers from the very custom house where Nathaniel Hawthorne was one day to be a starving clerk, they went away cursing the country and suspecting nothing. It was Columbus who discovered America to stay dis- covered. How he ever managed to do it without the backing of Mr. Randolph Hoist (as it has been ingeniously suggested THE VIKINGS ABANDON BOSTON AND SEEK WAKMER CLOU'S FARTHER NORTH