Life, 1910-05-26 · page 16 of 44
Life — May 26, 1910 — page 16: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page from Life magazine contains three satirical pieces criticizing wealth, idleness, and social hypocrisy in early 20th-century America. **"Why He Was Successful"** mocks the myth of self-made men, listing contradictory reasons for success before revealing the real answer: inherited wealth ("father's tin"). **"Stockholders"** ridicules wealthy investors as parasitic do-nothings who profit without labor or accountability. The satire notes they avoid consequences that befall workers and managers, caring only about dividend checks they don't understand. **"A Few Left"** responds to a London newspaper claiming women are losing beauty through athleticism and thinking. Life's author sarcastically agrees women are "harder" now, but argues this is exaggerated—soft, gentle women still exist and actually outnumber the publicized "modern" types. The piece ironically celebrates traditional femininity while acknowledging social change. The Mark Twain quote on animal testing provides moral commentary unrelated to the above sections, opposing vivisection on ethical grounds regardless of scientific benefit.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
SOME ARE BORN KICIC Why He Was Successful Ss" S said because he had sand. Some, because he had ginger. ‘ome, because of an iron constitution. Some, because of his brazen impu- dence. Some said he was a man of finer ¢ Some called him the salt of the earth. Some said he was true steel. And some said it was only because of father’s tin. Stockholders ie school the other day a young lad was asked what he would rather be when he grew up. “A stockholder,’ he replied. He spoke more wisely than he knew. A stockholder is a wonderful being He has nothing whatever to do. He never has to be at a certain place at a certain time. He is never arrested and is never bathed in immunity. Some- times railroad engineers are arrested when the property of stockholders runs over a man; sometimes railroad direc- tors are sent to jail for working in the interest of stockholders, but these things do not worry the stockholders. Many of them do not keep track of such things at all. Others keep track of them only *LIFE- by proxy. only in The stockholder is interested the annual report. which he doesn’t understand and which he doesn’t care to understand if it is accompanied by a dividend check. Ellis O. Jones. A Few Left RECENT London dispatch in the papers says that women are gradually losing their beauty because of their athletic amusements and their mas- culine habit of thinking. They are no SOME ACINIEVE KICHES. longer soft, lovely, dependable creatures, but hard as nails, angular and argumen- tative. It certainly is not conducive to the highest sentiment to sce a woman's muscles rise and fall beneath a peek-a- boo shirtwaist, assuming that those ¢f- feminate garments are still worn, At the same time we doub: the case is so bad as the London papers would have us believe. It must be remembered also that the hard masculine creatures are the ones who have been advertised in the press. They therefore appear to be more nu- merous than they really are. {t is nat- ural for us to think that the things we in greater read about constantly are numbers. A careful investigation, conducted in parts of New England and throughout the intcrior, indicates that there are stili lovely creatures left among us, and that they far outnumber those who seem at present to be so far in the ascendant It is still possible to find some soft, gentle, clinging maiden, with purple eyes full of tender depths, whom we would still take pleasure in rescuing from a burning building, an abandoned wreck, or a gang of robbers Mark Twain's Opinion of It BELIEVE I arm not interested to know whether vivisection produces results that are profitable to the human race or doesn't. “To know that the results are profit- able to the race would not remove my hostility to it. The pain whic it inflicts upon unconsenting animals is the basis of my enmity toward it, and it is to me sufficient justification of the enmity without looking further.”” AND SOME MAVE RICHES THem THRUST UPON comicbooks.com