Life — September 16, 1920 — page 13: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This page features a photograph rather than a cartoon, showing two children standing in a dilapidated urban alley or courtyard surrounded by deteriorating buildings. The caption reads: "BUILDING: GREAT CARE IN BUILDING SOME PROPERTY, BUT GREAT LACK OF CARE IN BUILDING OTHERS." The image is social commentary on economic inequality and urban housing conditions. It contrasts wealthy property development (implicitly receiving investment and maintenance) against slum housing where poor residents, represented by the children, live in squalid, neglected conditions. The satire highlights the hypocrisy and indifference of property owners and urban developers who lavish resources on some structures while allowing others to decay dangerously—a critique of class disparity in early 20th-century American cities.