Life — March 18, 1920 — page 35: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This page presents a humorous visual history of California's development through six horizontal comic strip panels. Each panel depicts a successive stage: early settlers/pioneers, covered wagons and westward expansion, larger wagon trains, what appears to be a gold rush or population boom, construction and building activity (marked "Building Materials"), and finally modern development with various vehicles and activity. The satire critiques California's rapid, chaotic growth and transformation from wilderness to developed state. The increasingly crowded panels suggest accelerating development and population influx. The title's irony—condensing complex history into simple cartoon panels—mocks how such grand narratives are oversimplified. This likely reflects early-to-mid 20th century anxieties about California's breakneck modernization and urbanization.