Life, 1923-06-07 · page 16 of 44
Life — June 7, 1923 — page 16: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page from *Life* magazine presents six humorous cartoons about the mishaps that can happen to wedding gifts. Each scenario depicts a different domestic disaster: 1. A baggage handler sends a trunk to the wrong city 2. A silver watermelon set gets destroyed when left near an open window during burglary season 3. Wedding presents get broken during drunken revelry at a reception 4. A bridegroom damages gift boxes while digging in his garden 5. An African vase gets destroyed by someone's hat 6. A wooden staircase is damaged by a careless guest The satire mocks the anxiety newlyweds experience protecting expensive gifts and the various ways domestic life can damage even the most precious presents. It's gentle humor about the impracticality of formal gift-giving and home management.
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Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
The stupid baggageman, bewildered with a two-dollar bill, has selected the wrong rubber stamp and is sending to Springfield, Ill, instead of Springfield, Mass., an old trunk containing that wonderful samovar that Uncle Bates and Aunt Priscilla sent. The end of many wedding presents—placed thought- lessly in the Hooch Room. Ethlinda might have known what would happen to the magnificent Atrocian vase sent by Uncle Samuel and Aunt Betty when she unconsciously influenced Teddy Topple into this corner of the room. It is not hard to see what is going to happen to that silver watermelon set, sent by Uncle Spin and Auntie Lena, with the dining room window left so carelessly open, and the burgling season at its height. The young bridegroom, digging in the formal garden of his new place, must take care that none of the wedding gift book-ends fall into his excavations. Note the despair on the faces of these young folks when the handy young bridegroom around the house bashes one end of his stepladder square into that violently vivid woodcut sent by Aunt Katherine. Terrible Misfortunes That May Befall Wedding Presents comicbooks.com