Life, 1920-08-19 · page 15 of 40
Life — August 19, 1920 — page 15: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
**Top Cartoon:** "What's the stilts for?" / "That mean old cuss next door switched to pole beans." This is a visual pun about neighbors competing over garden crops. One farmer has built stilts (appearing as exaggerated figures on sticks) to grow beans higher than his rival's—a humorous commentary on petty neighborhood rivalry and competitive gardening. **Bottom Cartoon:** "Jones forgot how to shut off the power on his new lawn mower" Shows a man operating an early mechanical lawn mower that he cannot control, with it running wild across his property while others watch. This satirizes the awkwardness of new labor-saving technology and the gap between mechanical innovation and users' actual competence with machines. Both cartoons use domestic/rural humor common to Life's audience.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
| idan om WANA WAN ta MH “WHAT'S THE STILTS FER?” “THAT MEAN OLD CUSS NEXT DOOR SWITCHED TO POLE BEANS.” A Great Intellectual Moment Office of an intellectual weekly, devoted to politics, literature, art, music and other supremely important matters. Enter the editor and his assistant. DITOR: Wells? AssIsTANT: Quite so. “Have you secured an improper quota- tion from Rebecca West, referring to her, as usual, as the ‘brightest feminine mind in Great Britain’?” “Oh, yes.” “Have you mentioned that Jim Hune- ker is our greatest musical critic?” “ Certainly.” “Have you made our semi-yearly refer- ence to the lamentable fact that there is in America no great humorous journal at all comparable to Punch?” “Dear me, yes. That is not only an intellectual, but a patriotic duty.” “Have you expressed the customary hope that Booth Tarkington may yet equal some of the inferior British novelists?” “How could I overlook that?” “Have you reviewed and quoted some of the worst stanzas from our regular article and entitled it ‘A Group of Ris- ing American Poets ’?" “T have.” “Then if our weekly check has arrived Have you excoriated H. G. from the retired multimillionaire who is supporting us, the printers ought to be willing to let the next number come out.” V OMEN talk among themselves about other people. Men talk to other people about themselves. Willing Workers EW ARRIVAL (at mountain inn): Be very careful with that trunk, my man. Turee Bystanpers (leaping forward in unison): Let me help you up the stairs with it. JONES FORGOT HOW TO SHUT OFF THE POWER ON HIS NEW LAWN MOWER comicbooks.com