Life, 1911-08-24 · page 9 of 40
Life — August 24, 1911 — page 9: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
**The Image:** A fortune teller predicts to a woman client: "You are going to marry... a short, fat blonde." **The Context:** This is a joke about Wall Street's volatile market conditions during what appears to be an economic crisis. The accompanying article describes how rumors spread rapidly among brokers, causing market panic. Brokers lost money and became emotionally drained. **The Satire:** The cartoon sardonically suggests that amid financial chaos, a woman's romantic prospects are equally uncertain and ridiculous—the fortune teller's absurd prediction (marrying "a short, fat blonde") mirrors the irrational panic driving market decisions. Both fortune-telling and speculative investing are implicitly compared as equally unreliable ways to predict the future.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
FORTUNE TELLING OU ARE GOING TO MARRY A SHORT, FAT BLONDE” Bulls and Bears N ugly rumor got started in Wall Street immediately after the opening on Monday. Some careless person dropped the remark among some inflammable brokers to the effect that Wall Street was somehow connected with the wages of labor Before the rumor could be checked it spread rap- idly over the floor, encircled the betting posts, raced up and down the levator shafts, and finally took a seat in the visitors gallery and refused to be dislodged. Three alarms were sent in, and in less time than it takes to tell it there arrived on the scene statisticians, expert ac- countants, census enumerators, college professors, social set- tlement workers, and cditors of the Outlook. These went to work at once attacking the ugly thing with pens, pencils, adding machines, tape lines, maps, logarithms. and economic abstractions, and by one o'clock the rumor was under control. It proved beyond all possible cavil that for a working man Wall Street was a thing apart, while es were his whole existence. The result was a notable easing off in the heart action and pulse of the market. From ten te one, Pulse Commen had fluctuated between 90 and 95. At two o'clock it touched 88. At two-thirty it was 86, and it closed strong at 82. Tuesday being ironing day, there was much activity in the metal shares and at times they showed unusual warmth, but, it developed, there was not enough starch in the prices to keep them up to a proper state of stiffness. The result was a decided limpness. This was partly overcome, however, by the dryness of the brokers, who thereupon went outside and proceeded to liquidate The market on Wednesday plainly showed the effect of the week's early strenuositics. At ten-five, after the brokers were all in, it was scen that several of them were so weak from loss of profits that they had to be carried out. From then on until the bank statement, Saturday, every- thing possible was done in order to get the market in shape for the following Monday. comicbooks.com