Life, 1919-05-08 · page 41 of 46
Life — May 8, 1919 — page 41: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page mixes advertisements with a comic dialogue about alcohol's dangers. The main comic, "Two Experts on Alcohol," depicts a doctor visiting a sick young man at home. The mother worriedly explains her son "Jack" overworked and won't wake up; the doctor, after examination, dismisses her concerns, saying he can leave "this afternoon all right." The satire lies in the irony: the mother mentions she's preparing a paper on "Evils of Alcohol," yet the doctor's casual reassurance about a dangerously unresponsive patient suggests either medical incompetence or—more likely—that alcohol is involved in the illness, which neither adult openly acknowledges. The "two experts" are implicitly hypocritical: one lectures about alcohol's dangers while her son may be suffering from it. The surrounding ads (Mum deodorant, Thompson motor cars, Cuesta Rey cigars) reflect 1920s consumer culture, likely during Prohibition, when discussing alcohol's dangers was socially prominent.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
easy ty use as to $39) takes all the odor out of perspiration nd gently neutralizes all other dy odors. 4 litle * Mum’? applied after the ning bath, keeps body and cloth- scleananc sweetalldayandevening, ium” is barmlesstoskin and clothes, tepartment-stores, or by mail post- on receipt of 26¢. istered in U. S, Patent Office. }106 Chestnut Street Philadelphia perts on Alcohol American home. hurrying down-stairs and Ob, doctor, Lam so glad 1 was afraid that you rstand from the telephone sh her to know that, ent, he broke his neck Yes, it was fortunate that | et the call just when I did. My boy, Jack, is so sick. rp eerily following her up 1, we'll do what we can to sing in upper hall): You heen preparing my paper on of Alcoho and I am to fternoon, and, of course, JAn Example of 's Hostrson Custom Coach Work—THe CONCORUE Limousine sick won't yo HOSE contemplating the purchase of Custom-Built Motor Car Bodies will find the Thompson Portfolio of Illustrations and Information extremely helpful. N it are depicted the graceful, distinctive lines of body, but the interior appointments as well, of new models created in the Thompson — permits the purchaser of a Thompson body to shops; the luxurious and exclusive Thompson — express his own individuality and personal taste Md to see you, (Looking at interior fittings. in his motor car, no less than in his home. cultar as much as to say, veiled “:”) Really, there's noth- The opportunity for selecting not only the type The Portfolio will be forwarded upon request. matter with me. There, there, dearie, don't THOMPSON MOTOR CAR BODIES loctor, you have no idea how E. J. Thompson Co., Forbes Field, Pittsburgh, Pa. 1765 Broadway, New York was! He worked too hard at Exclusive the office last night. You see, it is his Havano Cigar first posi he is so ambitious MADE IN BOND He was ¢ Mf ill after he came U.S. GUARANTEE home, and he wouldn't even wake me up READ THE WHITE STAMP ON CACH BOX= to tell me about it. If I didn’t have to " read my paper this afternoon on the Cuesta Rey am “Evils of Alcohol "— HAVANA TAMPA — since 1804 Tue Doctor (abstracting from his pocket a clinical therm 4 plac: ing it under the young man’s tongue, hile he takes his hand): 1 think you can leave him this afternoon all right, (Continued on page 823) comicbooks.com