Life, 1919-07-03 · page 21 of 52
Life — July 3, 1919 — page 21: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
**Upper Cartoon:** "Deadwood Gulch Is (More or Less) Reconciled to Its Fate" A Western saloon scene depicting the decline of the Old West frontier town. The satire suggests that frontier settlements like Deadwood, once vital, are now accepting their obsolescence—they've been absorbed into modern civilization much like a vortex consumes its prey. **Article: "Bolshevism and Sun Spots"** This piece compares Professor George E. Hale's astronomical theory about sun spots (destructive vortexes) to Bolshevism. The satire equates the Soviet revolutionary movement to an all-consuming force that destroys everything it encounters and "never gives anything up"—suggesting Bolshevism as an existential threat that obliterates whatever enters it, leaving nothing behind. **Lower Cartoon:** A domestic humor scene where a wife questions her husband's constant clumsiness. His response—that he's a professional humorist working on comic series ideas—mocks humorists' self-absorption and their tendency to weaponize real-life mishaps for material. The page reflects 1920s American anxieties about Bolshevism and modernization alongside lighter domestic comedy.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
DEADWOOD GULCH 1S (MORE OR LESS) RECONCILED TO ITS PATE Bolshevism and Sun Spots come of them. There would be nothing RESENT-DAY styles may shock, ROFESSOR GEORGE TF. HALE, _ left but. a few spots, marring the deso- but when the girl is shapely she . late surface of a once-beautiful world, acts as a mighty good shock-absorber. a California astronomer, has con- cluded that a sun spot is a g tic electric vortex, and that the earth could be dropped into one of average size without crowding the vortex to any noticeable degree. And after the earth had been dropped in, and the vortex had gone on with its vortex- ing for a few moments, there would be nothing but vortex left. The earth would have been nothing but a light lunch for the vorte: d when the vortex had consumed it, it would con- tinue its labors, greatly refreshed. The action of asun spot, if Professor Hale is correct, is singularly like that of Bolshevism. Bolshevism is a gigantic vortex, which gladly receives every- . thing that is dropped into it, whirls its + prey around wildly, absorbs it com- pletely, and never gives anything up. Tt destroys utterly, and complacently goes on with its vortexing. All the peoples of the world could be dropped “Is YOUR HUSBAND ALWAYS So CLUM?" into the vortex of Bolshevism and “NOT ALWAYS} BUT HE IS A PROFESSIONAL HUMORIST, YOU KNOW, AND HE IS nobody would ever know what had be- TRYING TC THINK UP AN IDEA FOR A COMIC SERIE comicbooks.com