Life, 1921-03-31 · page 27 of 34
Life — March 31, 1921 — page 27: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page of satirical cartoons by P. L. Crosney mocks everyday social pretense and hypocrisy. The top panel ridicules a boy who wakes at 5 A.M. to take an ice plunge, claiming it clears his mind for school—absurd self-improvement theater. The middle cartoon shows salesmen lying to a customer about a hat's quality, satirizing commercial dishonesty. Another depicts men drawing a "Royal Flush" at cards—likely referring to card cheating or gambling deception. The bottom sketches show a "gentleman of the old school" and men's reactions at an aquarium to a "funny fellow," suggesting mockery of social pretension and awkward masculinity. The overall theme: these exaggerated scenarios depict fraudulent, vain, or duplicitous behavior that audiences wouldn't see in sanitized movie entertainment of the era, offering biting social commentary instead.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
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