Life, 1916-02-24 · page 11 of 48
Life — February 24, 1916 — page 11: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
The main cartoon depicts a social gathering where a woman seated on the right observes a group of men at a table. The caption reads: "Say, Liz, ain't the two old guys queer? They must be foreigners. What?" This satirizes casual xenophobia and class prejudice among American socialites. The "two old guys" appear to be poorly dressed or foreign-looking, prompting disparaging comments from the observer. The joke targets both the narrow-mindedness of upper-class Americans and their reflexive assumption that anything unusual must be "foreign." Below are text pieces titled "A Hopeless Case" (about an employment agency) and "The Medical Circle" (satirizing how doctors create demand for their own services). These are typical Life magazine social commentary.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
wa Co “ SAY, LIZ, AIN'T THE TWO OLD GUYS QUEER! THEY MUST BE FOREIGNERS. WHAT?” A Hopeless Case a wat can you do?” The manager of the employ- ment agency gazed pityingly at the ap- plicant before her, who buried his face in his hands. “Madam,” he said, brokenly, “at one time I was a man of the greatest cul- tivation, with the keenest sense of what is finest in literature; particularly in poetry. Now my taste has gone, my sense of rhythm has departed, my mind, alas! is weak and mushy and vulgar. I'll take any job you can give me.” “May I ask, sir, what has brought you to this low level?” The miserable wretch sighed. “ Madam,” he said, “during the best years of my life I was the editor of an international hymn-book, now used in many of our largest churches.” CHIEF: among the humors of the war is the Kaiser's insistence on recruiting “Gott.” But even that is pretty grim. It is a very serious war. The Medical Circle 'HIS, then, is the medical circle: to build more medical colleges to make more doctors to discover more diseases to invent more germs to need more scrums to poison more patients to cause more illness to require more expert medical advice to necessitate more medical colleges to make more doctors to discover more diseases to invent more germs to need more se- rums to poison more patients. be married is half divorced.