Life, 1923-08-09 · page 26 of 36
Life — August 9, 1923 — page 26: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This is not a satirical cartoon but rather a **philanthropic feature** promoting Life magazine's Fresh Air Fund. The page describes a charitable program sending poor urban children from New York City to rural farms (in New Jersey and Connecticut) for summer respite. The two photographs show children experiencing countryside benefits—fresh air, green spaces, and wholesome food—contrasting with crowded city tenement conditions. The reference to "Sir Izaak Walton" (a famous angler) appears to be a whimsical caption. The bulk of the text lists donors who funded "Fresh Air Endowments" at $200 each, naming each gift in memory of deceased relatives or after living family members. This was Life's method of soliciting charitable contributions while publicly acknowledging donors—essentially advertising the charity to encourage further giving. **No satire or political commentary is present**; this is straightforward philanthropic advocacy typical of early-20th-century American magazine fundraising.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
LIFE Summer Days Down at Rosy Cheeks Farm VER in the Jersey Hills, at Rosy Cheeks Farm, a lot of poor New York children—thanks to their big benefactor who gave the farm to Lire’s Fresh Air Fund, and to the unfailing generosity of Lire’s readers—are for- getting for a too short time that there are such things as hot pavements, stuffy bedrooms and the bad air and bad smells of the city’s crowded district in midsummer. Those kiddies are forming a close acquaintance, perhaps their first, with green grass, big trees and the open sky. They are learning the happiness of paddling in a brook with no policeman to interfere. They are finding out how much good wholesome food can be contained in ther diminutive tum-tums. They are sleeping in big airy rooms with the fresh country air breezing into their little lungs, all of which leads to the disappearance of sallow skins and hollow faces—which is why we call the hundred and fifty. Jersey acres Rosy Cheeks Farm. Up at old reliable Branchville, in Connecticut, where Lire’s Fresh Air Fund ‘has been carrying on the work for years, the same agreeable process is being applied to two SIR IZAAK MINIATURE WALTON, EDITIONS. “HERE WE ARE ROSY CHEEKS!” hundred and fifty children every fortnight. Lire js ashamed to say anything about money in connection with an ideal state of child happiness, but the Fund has had to go into its pocket pretty deeply to get the work at Rosy Cheeks on a running basis. Of course there is no limit to the number of Fresh Air Endowments which may be created. Each one, at a cost of two hundred dollars, may be given a name by its donor and each assures that every summer, for all time, a poor child from New York will be sent for a fortnight’s stay in the country. : The Fund has received from Mrs. A. P. Tallman, of Wheeling, West Virginia, funds to establish FRESH AIR ENDOWMENT No. 255 In Memory of HELEN. From an anonymous donor in Alpine, New Jersey, for FRESH AIR ENDOWMENT NO. 256 In Memory of My Moruer. From Frank H. Bessenger, Esq’re, of Detroit, Michigan, for FRESH AIR ENDOWMENT No. 257 In the Name of Frank H. Bessencer, Jr. From F. M. Graff, Esq’re, of Blairville, Penns vania, funds to establish three Endowments as follows: FRESH AIR ENDOWMENT NO. 258 In the Name of THatia FRESH AIR ENDOWMENT NO. 259 In the Name of Matcotm FRESH AIR ENDOWMENT No. 260 In the Name of Pace. From Sarly Kominoth, Westbury, New York, for FRESH AIR ENDOWMENT No. 261 In the Name of Kominorn. (Acknowledgments of current contributions to the Fund will be found on page 32.) comicbooks.com