Life, 1917-03-01 · page 38 of 42
Life — March 1, 1917 — page 38: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains a multi-panel satirical story titled "Doomed" mocking wealthy, frivolous society during the Jazz Age. The narrative follows an Ass (a donkey—used as a literary device for stupidity) who acquires a house through easy credit, hires an interior decorator to extravagantly furnish it, and engages a social secretary to orchestrate wasteful entertainments. The satire targets: - **Easy consumer credit** and financial recklessness - **Conspicuous consumption** among the wealthy (decorating "in the most atrocious manner") - **Charity theater** (the "twelve-thousand-dollar monkey" dance) - **Class pretension** and hollow social rituals The punchline: the taxi driver refuses service because the cemetery visit is outside the Fifth Avenue zone—even death cannot escape monetary calculation. The Ass, facing financial ruin, requests an alcohol cocktail rather than confront reality. The surrounding advertisements for toothpaste and soap represent period consumer culture being satirized in the main story.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
Forhans Dental Hints: Does Your Tooth-Paste Help Your Gums? ieee many a pretty mouthwith the prettiest kind of teeth, but with tender and sensitive gums that the touch of a tooth-brush makes painfull Harden your gums or you'll lose our teeth. Prevent all tenderness and breeding with Forban’s Preparation every time you clean your teeth. Pre- vent at once the gum-shrinkage — that condition known as Pyorrhea (Rigg’s Disease) — which loosens teeth and exposes their unenameled partstodecay. If you're approaching 40 — the age when four out of every five le’s, gums commence to shrink — the rea- sons for Forhan’s are just automatically increased. Forhan's prevents gum-shrinkage — and it hardens gums, wholesomes them, healthies them. There's never a tender gum area with Forhan's. If gum-shrinkag@ has already set in, start using Forhan’s and consult a dentist immediately for special treatment. In 30c and 50c tubes in U. S. i 6 ‘ For the Gums Use it as a Dentifrice in’ stamps and we will send 5 trial tubes. Forhan Co, 202 Sixth Avenue, New York NSTANT PEAR OF DISEASE 1S A GOOD BEGINNING. POLITICAL DOCTORS ARE CONTROLLING PUBLIC SCHOOLS. CATCH 'EM WHEN THEY ARE YOUNG. ke deus Doomed (Continued from page 362) “Sell you a house and lot,” said the real estate man playfully. “Do we have to pay anything for it?” inquired the Ass. “Certainly not,” said the real estate man, “The idea! For instance, you can get your life insured. Then you can borrow the money to pay a frac- tion of the house and lot. Then you can get the rest on bond and mortgage —horrid words, aren’t they? There are other ways, of course. But you don’t have to bother about anything. Just give me your card and it will all be arranged for you.” Having selected a house and lot, they went along a little further and met an interior decorator. “TI presume,” said the interior deco- rator, “that, as usual, you will let me go ahead and decorate your house in the most atrocious manner possible, as an advertisement, without offending my dignity by presuming to offer any suggestion.” “Certainly,” said the Ass. “ That is, as I understand, the customary thing.” The Ass now consulted his platinum wrist-watch, and turned to their social secretary, who, a short time before, had insisted upon taking a position with them for nothing because times were So easy. “We must hurry a little,” said the | Ass to the social secretary, “so you'd better make a list of things we should do, so that this Avenue won't owe us anything when night sets in.” So the social secretary made a note that they were to have all their res- taurant bills charged to the Rockefeller Foundation for the relief of. indigent millionaires, that they were to give a twelve - thousand - dollar monkey Thé Dansant in order to help keep other people's money in circulation, and that they were to be operated upon for ap- pendicitis. When this program had been carried out the Ass rang for a taxi. “Drive us to Woodlawn Cemetery,” said the A! “There's nothing more to see in life. Why should we continue to live?” The taxi driver eyed the Ass with a kind of nonchalant suspicion, as a really great novelist would put it. “You'll have to pay cash,” said the taxi cab driver, “ because that’s out of the Fifth Avenue zone.” This made the Ass smile wearily, as he waved him off, turned to his wife, who, by the way, was trying to enjoy herself by flirting with another Ass, and rang the bell for the alcohol man. “Give me a twilight-sleep cocktail. My dear, excuse me for interrupting For a Sample Cake Send a 2c Stamp GLYC ER UNE SOAPS = == say 3 ‘ou can get this most delightful of soaps at your favorite jent store or druggist. 1d once used, you will realize why for over sixty years women of refinementin every civilized land have made it their all-time choice. White Rose ATI, Glyceriné Soap Pure and transparent as choicest materials and skill can make tt, No. 47: White Rose Giycerine Soap gives a skin clear and tomed, ies MULHENS & KROPFF, Dept. L., 25 West 4Sth Street, New York you, but I haven't a red cent, so we'll have to continue to live on Fifth Ave- nue indefinitely, even though we've done everything. We simply cannot afford to dic.” T. L. M. ENY, meeny, miny, mo; Catch a nigger by the toc. You're it!” Meaning that if you had ordered your copy of Lire in advance the dealer would not have told you he was “sold out.” DELATONE Removes Hair or Fuzz from Face, Neck or Arms and well-known selentifie preps ratio ler form, for the quick,safe and certain jatter how thic make a paste by mixing in the halry surface. After two or three mimuter, rub iff the paste and the hairs gue. When th: fished it will tae e 17's. Delatone is ‘ear, apd is highly recommended by heauty autl (dress upon receipe of One Dollar & The Sheffield Pharmacal Comp: any 339 So. Wabash Ave., Dept. D. F., Chicago, Illinois comicbooks.com