Life — January 3, 1918 — page 6: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

# Analysis This is **not a political cartoon or satire** — it's a straightforward product advertisement from *Life* magazine for the **Mimeograph**, a copying machine made by the A.B. Dick Company (Chicago and New York). The image shows a man operating an early mimeograph machine, with text promoting its business benefits: it can produce 5,000 copies of letters or forms per hour "at almost no cost." The ad emphasizes labor-saving and cost-reduction advantages for offices and businesses during what it calls "strenuous days" — likely referencing post-WWI industrial America when efficiency improvements were commercially attractive. The advertisement offers a free instructional booklet ("W") addressing "present labor emergencies," suggesting workforce management concerns of the era.