Life, 1923-07-05 · page 25 of 40
Life — July 5, 1923 — page 25: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page from *Life* magazine contains witty social commentary typical of early 20th-century American satire. **Top cartoon**: A barber shop scene where a customer, mid-tooth brushing, reminds the barber not to forget he came for a shave—a joke about absent-mindedness or distraction. **Bottom cartoon**: A man driving a car with passengers encounters another driver; when asked how long it took his wife to learn driving, he responds "ten years in August"—a joke implying his wife is a dangerously incompetent driver, with the humorous suggestion that she'll finally learn in ten years. **Text snippets**: Brief satirical aphorisms, including references to Prohibition ("triumph of the blue law over the red nose"), eccentric behavior, and social annoyances like secondhand cigar smoke. One note jokes about "permanent wave" hairstyles in relation to saying goodbye. The humor assumes readers' familiarity with Prohibition-era debates and early automotive culture when women drivers were still novelties worthy of ridicule.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
LIFE .- Notes Here and There TE repeal of the Mullan-Gage Law: a step backward ir 1 the right direction. ex An eccentric is one who is in the habit of doing things that he is not in the habit of doing. e** Could the appropriate gesture accompanying ‘“Good- by, forever” be properly termed a “permanent wave"? eae The basis of all reform: the joy of suppressing joy. eee \Vhat the nation needs is not so much a good five-cent cigar as a good breeze for those who sit next to the fel- low who smokes a five-cent cigar. eee Surely everything that appears in the photographic sec- tions of the Sunday supplements may be said to be done up brown. eae What is so rare (not as a day in June, but) as a night in the land of the midnight sun? +++ “WHEN YOU ARE THROUGH BRUSHING MY TEETH, BAR- Prohibition: triumph of the blue law over the red nose. BER, DON’T FORGET I CAME FOR A SHAVE.” MGUIFZ WL Br NZ “HOW LONG DID IT TAKE YOUR WIFE TO LEARN TO DRIVE?” “IT WILL BE TEN YEARS IN AUGUST.” comicbooks.com