Life, 1914-11-12 · page 22 of 48
Life — November 12, 1914 — page 22: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
**Top Image:** A darkly lit scene showing what appears to be a coffin or casket with mourners gathered around it—likely depicting a funeral or wake. The caption "Come on, pardner; you can take me home now" suggests morbid humor about death. **Middle Section ("A Hint to Mothers"):** A cartoon illustration showing children playing with potatoes as toys, implying this explains why potatoes mysteriously disappear from households—children are consuming them during play rather than meals. **"The Ultimate Consumer" Essay:** Satirical commentary on vague business jargon. The author (E.O.J.) ridicules the term "ultimate consumer" as pretentious and meaningless. The point: anything consumed is consumed "ultimately" by definition, so using both words is redundant and confuses rather than clarifies. **"Defined" Dialogue:** Two working-class Irish characters (Casey and Maloney, suggested by dialect spelling) discuss "aigrettes" (feathered hat ornaments). Maloney defines it crudely as what you produce when you can't leave—a crude bodily function joke playing on class and accent stereotypes.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
“COME ON, PARDNER; YOU CAN TAKE ME HOME Now” A HINT TO MOTHERS THIS MAY RE WHY YOUR POTATOES DISAPPEAR SU MYSTERIOUSLY The Ultimate Consumer often hear of the Ultimate Consumer, but no circus proprietor or zoo manager has ever been able to exhibit one. And no wonder. We have been using this expression merely because it sounded good, because it was rhythmi and euphonious, not because we knew what it meant, If we had really meant anything particular by it, we would have had expressions to denote other kinds of consumers, such as proximate consumer or penultimate consumer or antepenultimate consumer. But, of course, when a thing is consumed, it is consumed, and, therefore, there can ye only one kind of consumer. When anything is consumed, it is consumed ‘ultimately. Accordingly, all consumers are ultimate consumers, Then why use two words to confuse an idea that one word makes per- fectly clear? Brith J. Defined Cc SE Phwat’s these “aigrettes” the talking about, Moike? Matoxey: Wasn't ye ivir in. sassiet Shure, it's phwat ye sind whin ye can't go. papers are ye ignoramous? comicbooks.com