Life — February 9, 1911 — page 2: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

# A Valentine Puzzle Advertisement (circa 1910s) This page is primarily **advertising, not satire**. It presents a Valentine's Day contest for a massage cream product. The large heart-shaped design contains a puzzle asking readers to identify a jar outline—presumably the advertiser's product jar. The contest offers cash prizes ($50 first prize down to $10 fourth prize) and asks contestants to complete an advertising slogan: "Don't envy a good complexion; use ___ and have one." The page includes testimonials praising the cold cream's benefits for skin and complexion. While the puzzle format creates mild entertainment value typical of early 20th-century marketing, this is fundamentally a **product advertisement using a contest mechanism** to engage readers rather than political or social satire.