Life, 1909-11-04 · page 22 of 52
Life — November 4, 1909 — page 22: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
**Top Cartoon:** "Yes, she owns 10,000 miles of railroads, and they say she's so mean she makes her husband trim his own hats." This satirizes wealthy female railroad magnates of the Gilded Age—women who controlled vast industrial fortunes. The joke plays on the contrast between immense wealth and petty domestic frugality, mocking both the woman's miserliness and implying emasculation of her husband. **"The Great Mogul":** A prose-poem satirizing a newspaper office in chaotic operation—editors, reporters, messengers, and "lies" (both literal and metaphorical) proliferating. It mocks sensational journalism and the frenzy of news production, personifying falsehoods as active agents infesting the newsroom. **"Marine Finance":** A humorous analogy comparing ocean waves to financial entities—broke yet constantly "rolling in" money, owned by sharks and worthless speculators. It satirizes murky financial schemes and stock manipulation of the era. **"Explained":** A brief joke about gravity and hair loss, playing on "personal magnetism."
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
1912 “VES, SHE OWNS 10,000 MILES OF RAILROADS, AND THEY SAY SHE’S SO MEAN SHY MAKES HER HUSBAND TRIM: HIS OWN HATS The Great Mogul EHOLD, the Newspaper office. Editors, sitting at their desks, arranging copy. Behold the floor, littered with the flotsam and jetsam of men’s brains. Reporters are coming in and going out again. them are writing hurriedly. Messenger boys obtrude themselves at occasional intervals. Telephones. Little lies are hiding behind manuscripts. Big lies are stalk- ing about as if they owned the place. Sensational lies are trying on new clothes before the dingy mirror over the wash stand. Women. Bright looking feminine faces leaning over scrawled pages. Women with semi-smart clothes, business looking women, hurried women, tired, energetic, calm, in scrutable, vivacious. All kinds. The hum of presses in the distance. Vague, intermittent ominous; sounds of joy, sounds of woc, sounds of hopes gone—of the jail, of the church, of the assembly, of the open strect, of the interminable tangle of life. Sounds of the sea, waves thundering, men crying for help. More lies. Trooping importantly. Bashful, hiding them selves. Lies that dodge in and about. Blatant lies, straight forward lies, happy and singing lies. They march and countermarch, deploy, teeat and come on again. The editorial writers pass out on their way home ‘The proofreaders return for their revises ‘The pressmen wait in the distance. Hush. Lull. Then the hum grows louder. The great press vibrates The news is rolling on and outward. Some of vance and re- Marine Finance 11D you ever stop to think what queer financing there is in the waves of the ocean? Although the waves always have a roll of green, you will mostly find them broke—or at least breaking; and this is especially strange, because most of them are near the bank and they are generally reputed to have the sand. But every time a wave comes to make a deposit on the bank is mererly to play a shell game and the long green rolls out as fast as it rolls in. All sorts of sharks and worthless skates are living every day upon its roll and they are respon- sible for large and heavy drafts upon it The ocean waves have large marine in: teresis and claim thousands of ships as their property, but countless sales of these ing on every day over their heads of which they get no benefit at all. -y are also said to be owners of valu- able salt resources, but the funds are sunk so deeply and the stock is so highly wa- tered that they are practically valueless. But in spite of these financial handicaps the waves boast of a wonderful aristoc racy. They have always been “in the swim,’’ they have made countless splashes at the most fashionable seashore resorts of every country and their family crest is re veered around the globe and dates back centuries to the days when their father Neptune was king of the heavens Explained ROFESSOR KNOWITT: You've been studying about the scalp, Mr. Freshe. Can you tell me why my hair keeps falling out? Fresue: The laws of gravitation, sir. If you had the least personal magnetism, sir, your hair would fall in Passenger Who Has Just Awakened: 1 sway, canny! WHERE IN THUN’NER D’ I PICK UP ALL THESE ACQUAIN’ENSES? comicbooks.com