Life, 1918-04-25 · page 34 of 40
Life — April 25, 1918 — page 34: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page mixes advertising, war correspondence, and book promotion typical of Life magazine during WWI era. **Main Content:** The "Letters from the Front" section features a first-person account from an ambulance driver stationed at Boulogne, France, describing the horror of trench warfare near Verdun and Fort Douaumont. He witnesses shell explosions, destroyed vehicles, and traumatized soldiers—conveying the brutal reality of combat to American readers. **Advertisements:** - **Boston Garter**: A men's garter claiming 39 years of service - **Dr. Jeanne Walter's Reducing Garments**: Weight-loss corsets for men and women - **"Drowsy"**: A novel about a woman whose "control of waves of thought" creates romantic complications The juxtaposition is striking: amid graphic war descriptions sits an ad for reducing rubber garments, reflecting how American consumer culture operated largely uninterrupted during the war, with advertising normalized on pages documenting soldiers' suffering.
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Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
Combines ‘ ease, efhiciency & are sold in and long life. men’s wear shops The high grade from coast to coast. webbing gives a ae 386 BOE firm, resilient and Geonce frost co. comfortable hold. MARKERS, BOSTON Letters from the Front (Continued from page 688) From an Ambulance Driver As I write this letter I am sitting on each at Boulogne looking across ish Channel watching the troop so the little destroyers transports and that where. You see, I'm on my cight-day » dodging in and around every permission, My! but it is wonderful to ng here, breathing in the wonder- salt air rather than the smell of pow- and burning oil, The town is just ked full of English Tommies and of- TS. The latter are certainly a won derful looking bunch of men. Well, i suppose you would like to know what [ think of the front and also the engines of war. Sherman was right, but he didn’t express it hard enough the front of Verdun near mont and Fort des Vaux dur ck of the zoth and We were Fort Dor the big ing also, Reducing Your Flesh free men} burden of, unbyg ‘DR. JEANNE WALTER'S Famous Medicated REDUCING RUBBER GARMENTS FOR MEN and WOMEN DR. JEANNE G. WALTER Billings Bid@., 4th floor 353 Fifth Ave., N. Y. City Ent. on 3th Si 3d Door East of the 23th, The French did wonder- fully, and they certainly plastered it the Boche for good and proper. Surely the Lord is on the side of the nbulance driver, for out of twenty cars thirteen were hit by shells, and only one man hurt Sea seriously. : a It is beyond my comprehension how is men can stand in trenches in mud and oe water while high explosives are bursting Ee and whining all around them. Tt is awful ae to see a lot of men coming out of the “So, if this story of Drowsy seems a fairy tale, let us remember that the Atlantic Cable would be a fairy tale to Columbus.” This, from the author's preface, indicates that the new novel by the editor of Lire is more on the lines of * Amos Judd,” * The Pines of Lory” and “The Last American” than like his more recent novel, “ Pandora’s Box.” It is the somewhat romantic narrative of a woman and a s lover, whose control of waves of thought brings about exciting and sign nt hap- penings. DROWSY e¢ title (that ause of his unusual eves). By was the nickname given” the hero ms \Mes Mireur. over 300 pages 20 remarkable illustrations, and 22 amusing decorat ¢ author Published by Stokes. Sent upon receipt of Sig0 by Lire Pentisiaxe Comeayy ( 7 West gist Street, New York City Second edition | comicbookse@may