Life, 1913-01-09 · page 37 of 100
Life — January 9, 1913 — page 37: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
**Top Cartoon (Moral):** Depicts a car accident under a bridge where a woman driver has crashed. The moral warns men against distracting female drivers with romantic gestures—a commentary on the novelty and danger of women operating automobiles in the early automotive era. **Middle Text ("The Process"):** A dialect-heavy joke about a Baptist revival meeting in Georgia. An evangelist asks congregation members to stand if they want their souls "washed white as snow." One man declines, claiming his soul was already washed—at a Methodist church. The punchline: it was "dry-cleaned," not washed, mocking the man's spiritual authenticity and playing on sectarian differences between denominations. **Bottom Cartoon:** Shows men rejecting a type of car (appears to be a truck or commercial vehicle), preferring another kind—likely satirizing consumer preferences or automobile marketing during the early 1900s automotive boom. The page reflects early 20th-century American attitudes: anxieties about women drivers, racial stereotypes in dialect humor, and emerging car culture.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
MORAL DON’T TRY TO KISS HER WHILE SHE IS DRIVING THE MACHINE The Process REVIVAL was being held at a small colored Baptist church in southern Georgia. At one of the meet- ings the evangelist, after an earnest hut fruitless exhortation, requested all of the congregation who wanted their souls washed white as snow to stand up. One old darky remained sitting. “Don’ yo’ want y’ soul washed write as snow, Brudder Jones?” “Mah soul done been washed w'ite as snow, pahson.” “Whah wuz yo’ soul washed w'ite as snow, Brudder Jones?” “Over yander to de Methodis’ chu’ch acrost de railroad.” “Lawd God, Brudder Jones, yo’ soul wa’nt washed—h’it were dry- cleaned.” A CIRCULAR letter—O. “COME ON, BILLY, THAT AIN’T THE KIND WE WANT ANYWAY” comicbooks.com