Life, 1913-12-04 · page 65 of 112
Life — December 4, 1913 — page 65: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains two distinct satirical pieces: **Top Comics:** "At the Coon Hollow Sunday School" depicts a Sunday school scene in two panels—the first showing chaotic Christmas week before the holiday, the second showing calm after. The title uses period terminology reflecting the magazine's era; the humor appears to target disruptive holiday behavior in religious settings. **Bottom Illustration:** "A Society for the Prevention of Useless Giving" shows well-dressed men and a woman, apparently members of an anti-gift organization. This satirizes excessive Christmas gift-giving culture, suggesting that wealthy society members were concerned about wasteful holiday spending. **The Text Below:** An unrelated romantic narrative about a working-class man (dialect suggests immigrant or lower-class character) who receives a romantic moment under mistletoe and dreams of leaving his hotel job for "somethin' more refined" after marriage—likely satirizing aspirational working-class romanticism. The page collectively mocks holiday excess, class pretensions, and sentimental working-class ambitions through separate but thematically linked vignettes.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
we ste PIPE pest d tA AT THE COON HOLLOW SUNDAY SCHOOL THE WEEK BEFORE CHRISTMAS, AND THE WEEK AFTER <== beers A SOCIETY FOR THE PREVENTION OF USELESS GIVING his shoulder and his lips found elo- quence inspired, burning in everything, but a few absurd conventions as to pronunciation, Then his eyes gazing upward, thank- ing the saints for the burden on his neck, suddenly caught sight of the branch on the gas jet. And a great wave of joy and a new knowl- cdge of feminine nature came upon him and educated him and gave him a degree all in a minute. He laughed huskily. His arms tightened about her and he spoke in a happy masterful, swag- gering sort of way into her hair. “When we're married, Mag,” he said, “T'm going to trow up dat job down at the hotel! I'm going to get into somethin’ more refined!”