Life, 1916-03-30 · page 10 of 45
Life — March 30, 1916 — page 10: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This 1916 *Life* magazine page contains political satire about World War I diplomacy. The bottom cartoon, titled "American Evolution (As Taught in France)," shows six profile sketches labeled with years tracking how France perceived American attitudes: from "English" (1914) through "Vengese" positions (1915-1916), culminating in a "Germ-Amer" or German-American figure (1916). The satire mocks American neutrality and suspected pro-German sympathies among hyphenated Americans. The text discusses a Detroit automobile company promoting "native or naturalized Americans" to management positions—criticizing it as suspect loyalty-testing during wartime. The upper sketch shows peasants with livestock, illustrating "A Young Man's Fancy"—likely commenting on wartime agricultural concerns. Overall, the page reflects American anxieties about divided loyalties and debates over neutrality versus Allied support.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
“A YOUNG MAN'S FANCY—”" The Notes (Poe was a neutral) OTE the Powers with their notes— Foreign notes! What a world of nicety their rhetoric denotes! How they bicker, bicker, bicker, Through the months and through the years, Each successive one is slicker, Suaver, more involved, and thicker— Governments, it thus appears, Can mark time, time, time In a slow myopic rhyme To the slight exacerbation that so courteously floats From the notes, notes, notes, notes, Notes, notes, notes— From the babbling and the dabbling of the notes! Note the neutral billets-doux At the news Of the sinking of six liners with their passengers and crews— How they flutter, flutter, flutter Through the cables, calm and bland, Nice amenities they utter, Honorable pleadings mutter, Delicately phrased and planned With great tact, tact, tact, Lest a diplomatic act Be interpreted “unfriendly,” which is quite against the view: OF the doux, doux, doux, doux, Doux, doux, doux, Of the authors of the silly billets-doux. Morris Gilbert. “WV HERE is your wife going this summer?” “She's looking around for some place where none of the women have more than two gowns. She has three.” Americans Only HAE patriotic automobile concern in Detroit which announced a few weeks ago that it would promote to positions of trust in its organization only native or naturalized Americans has never made known the result of its experiment. Did any of its people walk out? It would be interesting to know whether any of its hyphenated employees were so loyal to their foreign birthplaces that they would resent the implied re- Frussien 1914 flection on their loyalty to their Amer- ican pay. It would also be interesting to know whether any other manufac- turing concerns have followed the good example of the Detroit automobile company. Fallacies? E hold these fallacies to be self- evident: That all men are un- equal to one superman; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain alienable rights; that among these are death, bondage and the pursuit of Kultur; that to secure these rights the Hohenzollern government was _insti- tuted among men, deriving its unjust powers from the arrogance of the Kaiser; that whenever any independent government questions these ends, it is the right of Congress to alter or abol- ish it and to institute a new govern- ment, laying its foundations on such expedients and organizing its weak- ness in such form as to them shall seem most likely to affect their Kultur and Zabernism, 1915 AMERICAN EVOLUTION (As TAUGHT IN FRANCE) comicbooks.com