Life — March 20, 1919 — page 6: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

# Analysis This is primarily an **advertisement for the Mimeograph machine**, not political satire. The page occupies Life magazine's space 442 and promotes the A.B. Dick Company's copying device. The illustration shows a **parrot** mimicking human speech, which serves as a visual pun: the ad cleverly titles itself "The mimic!" to draw a parallel between parrots' imitative abilities and the mimeograph's capacity to reproduce documents. The advertisement emphasizes the machine's practical business value—it could make 5,000 copies per hour of "typewritten letters, forms, drawings, maps." The copy stresses cost savings for "business enterprises, governments, armies, navies and educational institutions." This represents **early 20th-century advertising strategy**: using clever wordplay and illustration to make office equipment seem essential and innovative to potential customers.