Life, 1917-09-13 · page 8 of 44
Life — September 13, 1917 — page 8: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This is a **safety advertisement disguised as moral commentary**. The "gambler" is any motorist who drives in wet conditions without tire chains. The dice imagery (left side) represents the element of chance—comparing unsafe driving to gambling with lives. The ad's message: installing Weed Tire Chains before rain isn't optional caution; it's a moral imperative. The gambler "pits skill against the Skid," but skill alone cannot prevent accidents on slippery roads. Only tire chains provide genuine safety. This reflects early 20th-century automotive anxiety: cars were still relatively new, roads unpaved or poorly maintained, and winter driving genuinely dangerous. The advertiser frames chain installation as a responsibility to passengers and other road users, using shame and morality rather than convenience as the sales pitch.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
The Motorist who does not stop to put on Weed Tire Chains before driving over wet-slippery-skiddy streets gambles with his life and the lives of others. Don’t tilt the dice-box with Fate—don’t pit your skill against the Skid that lurks at every turn of the wheel, when streets are wet and treacherous. No matter how skillfully and carefully you may drive, you and your passengers are in imminent danger if Weed Tire Chains are not on all four wheels when the rain whips streets into black deadly skidways. Give your Weed Chains a chance to’ perform their mission. Don’t leave them in the garage or tool box—put them on the tires. Only a moment of your time and their | steel forged protection will be securely chaining your car to safety. Weed Chains are sold by dealers everywhere for all sizes of the hun- dred and more ‘‘fancy tread’? tires. AMERICAN CHAIN COMPANY, Inc. SOLE MANUFACTURERS OF WEED CHAINS Bridgeport \@/ Connecticut In Canada—Dominion Chain Co. Ltd., Niagara Falls, Ontario