Life, 1912-12-19 · page 30 of 40
Life — December 19, 1912 — page 30: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page is primarily **advertisements and light humor** rather than political satire. The main content includes: **"Our Foolish Contemporaries"** — a humorous poem by Deems Taylor about Christmas Eve cynicism: the speaker feels alienated from holiday cheer because he already finished shopping yesterday, making him emotionally unavailable to the festive crowds below. **"The Same Old Story"** — a brief joke about an aviator and nervous assistant fearing death. **"The Poor Rich People"** — a anecdote where George W. Perkins (apparently a wealthy industrialist) jokes that nobody would believe stories about "rich but honest" people, only "poor but honest" ones — commenting on public skepticism toward the wealthy. The page is dominated by **period advertisements** for trains (Overland Limited), whiskey (Gibson's Rye), liqueurs, and patent medicines — typical Life magazine content from the early 1900s. The small cartoon showing a figure with a "Votes for Women" sign appears to reference **suffrage activism**, though context is unclear from this excerpt alone.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
OUR FOOLISH CONTEMPORARIES > = Thoughts, December Twenty-Fourth ‘Tis Christmas eve. The very air Scems charged to-night, seems subtly thrilled By glad provisions of a rare, Strange happiness, yet unfulfilled. I sense this thing, and still my heart Is numb, lethargic, dead. I hold Myself from all the world apart. The Christmas spirit leaves me cold. Below me, in the frosty street, I hear the city’s muffled song Of carnival—the tramp of fect, The voices of the passing throng. I watch them as they hurry by In kind confusion, faces bright With Christmas comradeship; but I— T am not one of them to-night. Each hastens, in that host below, To choose the gifts that shall delight Another on the morrow. No, Iam not one of them to-night The laughing crowd, the siren call Of blazing shops that beckon; nay. Untouched, unmoved, I hear it all I did my shopping yesterday! Deems Taylor, in Century. The Same Old Story Aviator (to young assistant, who has begun to be frightened): “Well, what do you want now?” Assistant (whimpering): “I the earth.”"—Lippincott’s. RUDYARD KIPLIN “A Plai author that he need never write that he had done enough; and yet i last mont want e phen Garbage Receiv: Caron Bitters. Tones the stomach—stimulates appetite. Im- proves life and flavor of any cocktail. Try them and be satisfied. Oct. C, Blache & Co.,78 Broad St., New York, Gen'l Distrs. of the wart lactory. PHENSON. Mfr. ‘Gusrantees GIBSON'S RYE A WHISKEY OF TRADITIONS RADITIONAL for high quality, absolute purity, satisfying richness, velvety mellowness, T delightful fragrance —nearly 80 years the whiskey standard of the world. Every drop of Gibson's is made from selected, matured tye and sparkling springg@@™Ater; ripened in a fixed tem- perature, and held in gft@soriginal wood. We especially commend the di 1900—the finest old whiskey ped from o American in England” and told the goc each. ‘Can't keep it down. Doubleday, Page & Co., Garden City, N. Y. Undergroand 1 pase to. look ws op. SS and Li ited‘ Fastest and Best Equipped Train between Chicago and San Francisco Unio n-Southern Pacific Standard Route of the West Deub'etrack. Automatic electric block safety signals Write tiday for Lexutifully ted boalet ‘adwus California, Address ‘ort, Passenger Trafic Manager Union Pacific Room 15, Omaha, Neb. Gerrit G read The Poor Rich People George W. Perkins was talking to a reporter about the obloquy, so frequently rnjust, which nowadays attaches to great wealth. “A little boy,” he marked to his father: “*Pa, T often read in the low-priced zines about “poor but honest pco- Why do they never say “rich but another book, t sold 13 copies said, “once re- in the er Ground honest “* Because, my son,’ the father an- swered, ‘nobody would believe them.” —New York Tribune. GREAT TR SPRING WATER 50 cents per case of G class stoppered bottles THE SUFFRA-JET Wine Jelly when flavored with Abbott's Bitters is 2% more delightful and healthful. Sample of bitters by malh3s cents, in stamps. C. W, Abbott & Co., Baltimore, Md. comicbookMeuwl