Life, 1917-12-27 · page 26 of 41
Life — December 27, 1917 — page 26: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains three distinct pieces of social commentary from the WWI era: **"Due on the Earth at Midnight"** (top): An illustration of an airplane approaching Earth at New Year's—likely depicting the "new year" arriving—paired with editorial questioning whether 1919 will genuinely represent change or merely repeat old failures (exploitation, outdated education systems, worship of money). **"When the Military Censor Reads the Letter"** (bottom left): A cartoon satirizing wartime censorship. The contrast shows how military censors would redact soldiers' personal letters to their sweethearts, leaving only sanitized patriotic content—a commentary on government control of information and soldiers' lost autonomy. **"Leaving Your Money"** (right): An expose piece about trustees misappropriating charitable donations. Edwin Gilbert bequeathed stock dividends to Life's Fresh Air Fund (a children's charity), but trustees allegedly refused to distribute funds. This appears to be public pressure journalism calling out financial malfeasance by named individuals. The page reflects WWI-era concerns: social reform hopes, government overreach, and institutional corruption.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
DUE ON THE EARTH AT MIDNIGHT Nominally New? HE question we should like you to answer, New Year, is this: Are you going to bea genuinely new New Year, or only the same old year in disguise that we have known all our lives? Are you going to ladle out the same old delusion about supply and demand? Are the schools to get as usual their ideas and methods from 1918 B. C.? Are we expected to bow down and worship the same old Dollar Bill? Are the common people to be exploited in the same old way? Eh? Or are we to have a really new deal all around, a simon-new year, fresh from the fields of hope and courage, with the light of daring in his eyes? Some of us are mildly curious about this, New Year, and, with very moderate expectations and in all humility, we'd like an answer, if you don’t mind. ornge Gi WHEN THE MILITARY CENSOR READS THE LETTER FROM HIS RIVAL IN THE TRENCHES TO THE GIRL THEY LEFT BEHIND THEM AND THE LETTER AS IT REACHED THE GIRL Salutation ROTHERS, salute the Flag as it swings by, Its glorious colors bright against the sky! Cheers for the Flag! Let not a lip be mute! Brothers, salute! Brothers, salute the Flag! Again it goes To face the line of our embattled foes As in past days of passionate dispute; Brothers, salute! Brothers, salute the Flag,—each stripe, each star! Be it our beacon and our avatar! Hail to the Flag! Let not a lip be mute! Brothers, salute! Clinton Scollard. Leaving Your Money T may be that some of Lire’s readers are contemplating bequests to Lire’s Fresh Air Fund. If so, they doubtless in- tend that the money shall be expended for the benefit of the poor children who are the beneficiaries of the fund. That being the pur- pose, a perusal of what follows may show that there are certain persons whom it would not be well to select as trustees. Of course, if one’s intention is to leave the money to the trustees and not to the children, that is a different matter. The late in Gilbert of Redding, Connecticut, in his will left three hundred shares of the Gilbert Manufacturing Com- pany with these instructions The dividends and income thereof to be used for the maintenance of the work carried on at Lirr’s Farm.” The reference is to the work of Lire’s Fresh Air Fund, with which Mr. Gilbert was familiar and in which he was interested. The “dividends and interest " accrued since December, 1910, now amount to considerably more than ten thousand dolla ‘The stock and the accumulated moncy have passed into the hands of Samuet J. Miter of Georgetown, Connecticut ; Dantet Davenport of Bridgeport, Connecticut ; Dr. R. W. Lowe of Ridgefield, Connecticut, and certain relatives and employees of Mr. Miller, acting as trustees and charged with the sacred duty of carrying out Mr. Gilbert's benevolent intentions. The accumulated income is sadly needed for improved sani- tation, fireproofing and increased dormitory space to add to the safety, health and comfort of the poor children Mr. Gilbert intended to help. Although Lire's Fresh Air Fund has re- peatedly requested and demanded that these funds be used as Mr. Gilbert directed, the trustees have not paid over the money. The presumption is that it is still in their hands. Under the laws of Connecticut there is no way to compel them to dis- gorge, comichookseeny