Life — January 1, 1920 — page 8: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

# Analysis This is an **advertisement**, not a political cartoon. It promotes the Mimeograph machine, manufactured by A.B. Dick Company of Chicago and New York. The ad's headline "Man-power!" uses a muscular male figure to metaphorically argue that tools extend human capability. The text compares the brain's limitations to muscular strength—both can accomplish more with proper equipment. The Mimeograph, it claims, enables rapid duplication of documents (letters, forms, drawings) without typesetting, producing "first copies ready within a few minutes" from a single stencil. This was revolutionary for early 20th-century offices and schools. The pitch targets institutions wanting efficiency: the machine supposedly multiplies intellectual and administrative output, making it economically valuable for "industrial and educational institutions throughout the world."