Life, 1908-07-02 · page 22 of 40
Life — July 2, 1908 — page 22: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page mocks the emerging "modern woman" of the late 19th/early 20th century through two satirical lists. The first, titled "In Their Earlier Years," contrasts a couple (labeled as E.H. Sothern and Miss Nelle Archer) with a schedule suggesting women spent 31½ hours daily on beauty rituals—an obvious impossibility meant to ridicule excessive vanity. The second list, "Success," sarcastically prescribes how a woman should spend her time "adhering to the rules laid down in magazines," again totaling impossible hours devoted to beauty treatments, dining, and social calls. The joke targets both the superficiality of women's magazines promoting endless grooming, and the leisure-class culture they represented. A separate item mocks the Republican Party's prize puzzle about electoral success, suggesting their "dust" (campaign rhetoric) was their only effective tool. The page satirizes gender expectations and consumer culture of the era.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
-LPEES In Their Earlier Years Modelling finger nails .........2...022... } hour Shaping eyebrows ceveeeeeeees } hour Pedicuring nails . seetaseiteaas: SHOU Sponge bath .......... sipauncnys/g our Dressing for dinne teveseeees 1 hour Dining (in simple, King Edward style)..... 1 hour Opera. . cieeeeees 2 hours Supper (mastication forgotten vee. 1 hour Hot bath sentaoraioeions .. 4 hour Brushing hair j wees } hour Massage and cold-cream..... vse 1 hour Physical-culture exercises +} hour hour $ hours --31} hours Me. EM, SOTHERN AND att Success nm woman, by adheri idly to the rules laid down + published for the guidance of her sex, can make the following useful disposition of her time cach da Physical-culture exercises...0.....-..0666 9 hour Morning tub » } hour Massage and applications of cold-cream ...° hour Brushing and treatment of ha ceo. 1 hour Manicuring nails . hour Eating breakfast, with thorough mastication 1 hour — Brisk walk.... hour Massage and anointing with cold-cream to Prize Puzzle Solved remove effects of wind. veceeeee 1 hour HY should the Republican Party be successful next No- Brushing dust out of ha vo. } hour vember?” asks the National Congressional Committee, Luncheon, with thorough mastication . hour and offers to pay $150 for the best answer. Afternoon nap .......+-- secees hour Well, chiefly because, although there probably won't be available Dressing for afternoon calls . hour so much as usual of the admirable dust most effective for throwing Making calls . tees 2 hours into questioning eyes, there is still a possibility of fooling enough of Massage and application of cold-cream..... 1 hour the people enough of the time. Brushing hair . . } hour Send the $150 to Lire’s Fresh Air Fund. R.B. THE REV, HENRY WARD BEECHER AND MBS. MARRIET BEECHER STOWE comicbooks.com