Life — May 17, 1923 — page 15: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This six-panel comic satirizes class pretension and social climbing. The narrative follows a working-class man who discovers an old ladder in his possession, suggesting it belonged to someone from "1893." He jokes about using it to climb socially ("undress me"). The humor revolves around the absurdity of inherited class markers—the ladder becomes a metaphor for social aspiration. The final panels show the man's domestic life, with references to a "Pullman family" (likely referencing wealthy Pullman railroad magnates) and the ironic suggestion that even humble possessions carry pretentious associations. The satire targets how ordinary people adopt or cling to symbols of upper-class status, mocking both the poor's social ambitions and the upper class's presumed superiority.