Life, 1920-08-19 · page 34 of 40
Life — August 19, 1920 — page 34: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page mixes advertising with humor typical of Life's satirical approach. The main advertisement is for **Williams' Holder Top Shaving Stick**—a refillable soap product where customers buy replaceable "Re-Load" inserts rather than new containers, saving money and waste. The humor content includes: 1. **"The Seven Ages of a Picture Star's Career"** — satirizes Hollywood's ageism and deception. Studios cast aging actresses as progressively younger characters (starting at 40 playing "grandes dames," ending at 14 playing child actors). The joke exposes how the film industry disguises actresses' real ages through lighting, makeup, and role selection. 2. **Smith-Jenkins dialogue**: A brief joke about "modern inconveniences" rather than conveniences—likely mocking how modern homes create problems despite their supposed improvements. The page also includes poetry ("In an Old Garden") and other period advertisements (Bell-ans indigestion remedy, The Cascades restaurant).
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
— THE Re-Load for the holder- top stick (one of the various ways to get the famous Williams’ lather) gives you the utmost in convenience and economy. The stick has a firm threaded collar which screws into the holder cap. When the soap has worn down to the collar, you simply unscrew and reverse it. When it is nearly gone, you buy a new Re-Load and stick the last bit of the old stick on the end of the new. Thus you use all the soap as well as save the price of a new container. Send roc in stamps for sample, full-size permanent holder-top, with reduced size soap. When the sample is used up, you need buy only the new Re-Load, sav- ing the cost of a new holder-top. THE J. B, WILLIAMS CO, Dept. A. Glastonbury, Conn. ns Tiguid and rial size In an Old Garden EYOND the gate, as each wind knows, Bloom pansy, marjoram and rose, Clove pink, begonia slim and gay, Prim lavender, and thyme and bay, And thorn trees hung with golden sloes. A blossom-laden lilac blows Its fragrance through the leafy close, Where in the dusk young lovers stray, Beyond the gate. Above the copse the dogwood chose A young moon's crescent faintly glows; And, charming grief and care away, A nightingale’s wild, wistful lay A spell of dim enchantment throws Beyond the gate. Charlotte Becker. LORA: How very sympathetic Mrs. Brooks is. Dora: Yes, she is never happy unless she is feeling sorry for somcone. 43rd and 44th Ses. and Madison Ave. The Cascades 19th Floor-—Always Cool Most unique dining room in New York. Beautiful deco- rations and lighting effects. Dancing The Seven Ages of a Picture Star's Career 1 While playing forty-year-old grandes * dames in Oklahoma City she is dis- covered by a director. 2. Plays scenic heavies, aged thirty, in a Los Angeles studio. 3. Plays Western and Alaskan leads, aged twenty-five. 4. Stars as a vampire, aged twenty, preferring the arc lights to exterior pho- tography. 5. To rehabilitate her reputation she plays simple-hearted Irish colleens, Yoo- kers school-girls and wronged younger sis- ters from Wisconsin, all about eighteen. 6. Imitates Mary Pickford, playing sweet-sixteen ingenues, eradicating wrinkles with Cooper-Hewitt lights and enamel. 7. Announces she will retire from the screen, even though merely a child actor— aged fourteen. MITH: You have a good home? Jenkins: Yes; all the modern in- conveniences. => 6 BELLANS Hot water D Sure Relief comicbooks.conma