Life, 1911-12-07 · page 72 of 112
Life — December 7, 1911 — page 72: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This satirical page from *Life* uses historical vignettes to mock contemporary social problems by contrasting them with an idealized past. The title suggests nostalgia for simpler times when issues were supposedly "easily disposed of." The sketches depict crude, period-style solutions to various social problems: dueling for political rivals, corporal punishment for "impudent" people, forced compliance for "flighty wives," and apparently violent suppression of religious dissent. The captions employ colloquial, dismissive language typical of the era's social attitudes. The satire operates on two levels: it mocks both the actual brutality of historical practices *and* contemporary nostalgia for "the good old days"—suggesting that longing for past simplicity ignores how those "solutions" were violent, authoritarian, and fundamentally unjust. The cartoonist critiques both historical barbarism and modern romanticization of it.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
a % ATNESSES WERE NOT GO RELUCTANT Duns Seldom Gornenco { (ING THETA EVI DENCE ONE, A SECOND THE INPUDENT COONS WERE ALMOST UN ANOWN A FUGHTY WIVES wERC VERY SOON BROUGHT TO TNeIN Senses. secs O10 NOT RECEIVE SO MUCH ENCOURAGEMENT + S S E SCANDA\ POLITICAL RIVALS were — THE DAL ROnGeR EASILY O'SPOSED OF SS wre set ouy sence a “IN THE GOOD OLD DAYS OF YORE” comicbooks Meal