Life, 1913-12-25 · page 16 of 41
Life — December 25, 1913 — page 16: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This is a mock advertisement for a fictional department store ("Doem, Good and Co.") that brazenly advertises dishonest Christmas shopping practices. The satire works by having the store openly boast about what retailers typically do *covertly*: marking up shopworn goods as new, misrepresenting merchandise quality, charging inflated holiday prices, and selling counterfeit items (fake French labels, non-genuine jewelry). The joke targets pre-holiday consumer culture and merchant dishonesty. By having the store's motto be "Always the utmost we can get out of you," Life reveals the cynical gap between retailers' politeness and their actual intent to defraud customers. The accompanying cartoons showing "how modern invention might" (depicting classical scenes like Aeneas and Dido) appear to be separate satirical sketches on the same page, unrelated to the main advertisement parody.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
THE SIRENS MIGHT HAVE SAVED THEIR VOICES Telling the Truth ESSRS. DOEM, GOOD AND CO. announce the opening of Their Great Christmas Stock To-morrow Prices especially raised For the Christmas Season! Immense showing of Shopworn Novelties! An accumula- tion of the past twenty years represented as entirely new! Superb chance for rare swindling! Each article exactly as misrepresented. Come early, while prices are high. Beautiful showing of Jewelry Novelties set with various stones. Positively none genuine! Unsuitable Gifts for Gentlemen Hideous Neckties at $1.00, formerly soc., Bath Robes at $10.00, marked up from $5.00, Misfit Slippers at double price! Cigars of cabbage and rope at the price of clear Havanas. Inappropriate Presents for Ladies Silk Stockings at $6.00 the box, not worth $3.00. K Gloves, the $1.00 kind at $2.00 the pair, 1910 Models in evening gowns, at this year’s prices, Hats with imitation French labels, at the price of the real imported article. “SE Er How Modern Invention Might For instance— AENEAS SECURES A LITTLE SOUVENIR OF QUEEN DIDO Book Department Beautifully finger-marked and fly-specked editions of the Poets at $1.19, original price 6oc. “Hens and Chickens: That's all.” A choice lot of in- artistic heads of women, by Harrison Dana Christy, Edition de luxe $10.00, worth much less. Special Fake “Bowls of Bilgewater,” by Bertha Beatrice Bulge, bound in buckram and beautifully boxed at $8.00, worth about roc. Art Department Hand-painted atrocities at greatly raised prices. Glittering Gimcracks for Guileless Givers! None genuine unless faded or finger-marked. Come carly and Stay late! We will rob you with courtesy and the most polite at- tention! Our Motto: “Always the utmost we can get out of you.” Harvey Peake.