Life, 1910-11-10 · page 16 of 44
Life — November 10, 1910 — page 16: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
## "Paying the Election Bet" Cartoon The top illustration satirizes expert accountants as self-important figures. The cartoon shows them dominating a chaotic scene—apparently depicting how accountants "collect" or assert dominance after elections (the "debt" being paid). The satire mocks the growing profession of expert accountants as pompous know-it-alls. ## "The Expert Accountant" Article This humorous essay ridicules expert accountants' arrogance and infallibility complex. The author recounts hiring one who, despite the business appearing solvent, declared them "running behind" according to modern accounting rules. The joke: the accountant's "expert" pessimism proved wrong—they've survived fine without following his system. ## "Life's Suffragette Contest" Life announces a contest offering $300 for the best reasons why men shouldn't marry suffragettes (women's voting-rights advocates). This reflects anti-suffrage sentiment of 1910, mocking suffragettes as undesirable spouses—a common satirical attack on women's rights activists, suggesting their advocacy made them unsuitable partners. The page captures early 20th-century attitudes: skepticism toward emerging professional expertise and hostility toward women's political activism.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
PAYING THE PLECTION DET The Expert Accountant T is said that expert accountants are multiplying. In view of this fact, and that the likelihood of meeting one at any time is becoming more cvident, should not something be done about it? At least should we not know how to guard against it? Let us, if we can, come to some conclusion about the na- ture and habits of this exalted per- sonage. There is a sense, of course, in which we are all of us expert accountants. No man would probably be willing to admit that he wasn’t one. But this stateme: is generally understood as being a joke. The real genuine expert accountant no one makes any mistake about. We run from him instinctively. When we can’t run from him make the best of it; we face him cheerfulness, Our own puny affairs we have managed all our lives with some slight success; we have a rag-tag and Lobtailed book in which for a number of years we have been in the habit of keeping our accounts—such as they are! Or we may have been so derelict as to carry the whole affair in our heads. We say this to the expert accountant with a deprecatory air. As for him, he is full of sympathy. From such a height he may well afford to be magnanimous. There is one n by which you can always know an expert accountant. No one, in the course of history, in the heavens above or the earth beneath or in the waters under the earth, was ever able to tell him anything that he didn't know. We have always thought it would be great fun—the greatest we can imagine—to get two expert account- together. What happen? The imagination fails. Once, in a moment of indifference to ants would any fate, we employed an expert ac- countant to go over our humble affairs, Up to that time we had been sailing along in the blissful consciousness th; all was well. Our three m ‘a about regularly, and some slight attempt at luxuries was our privilege. The expert accountant came and looked us over. He showed us sternly in figures t could not lie, that we had steadily been losing ground ever since we had started. In vain we told him that we owed no man and that there was money in the bank. “ Your sys- tem,’’ he explained, “is totally at vari- ance with the latest rules. You are, therefore, running behind.” We have been running behind ever since without him. We are ashamed to let him see us in the distance, going about our irregular and faulty business Only a blind trust in Providence, and a guilty consciousness of our own simple mindedness, keep us alive, TEACHER, after writing many times to a sm: pupil's parents, sent for his father. “Mr. Rubinstine, I am really worried about your lit- tle son. He is too bright; studies too much and too strenuously; he is delicate- looking and needs out-of-door exercise—a rest, in fact. He is fully a year ahead of boys of his own age.” Mr. Rustwstixe: Vell? Tracner (exasperated) : Well, he will have brain- fever; you will lose him. Mr. Rumwstine: Vell, 1 have four more just like at home The Cart Horse Life’s Suffragette Contest $300 to the Winner LIFE will pay the sum of Three Hundred Dollars for the best reason, or reasons, why any man should not marry a suffragette. CONDITIONS: Each answer must be limited to three hundred words. The manu- scripts, however, may be as short as the contestant prefers. Manuscripts must be typewritten, and should be addressed to Tue Contest Eprror oF Lire, 17 West 31st Street, New York. The contest is now on, and will close on December 31st, 1910. Manuscripts received after that date will not be considered. Lire will pay at its regular rates for all manuscripts published. The prize will be awarded by the Editors of Lire, and the announce- ment of the winner will be made as soon after January Ist, 1911, as possible. It is not necessary to be a regular subscriber to Lire in order to com- pete. The contest is open to every one. Manuscripts will not be returned unless accompanied with stamped and addressed envelope. Gre! i'M GLAD TL ALN’T STYLIS! comicbooks.com