Life — September 27, 1923 — page 13: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This is a humorous comic strip sequence from *Life* magazine featuring a character named Skippy (a small child in dark clothing). The strip shows Skippy interacting with various well-dressed adults in formal attire—men in suits and top hats, women in 1920s-style clothing. The joke's premise appears to be that Skippy possesses some secret or knowledge ("keeps things under his hat") that the adults around him either want to know or are unaware of. The repeated scenes show different adult groups attempting to engage with or learn something from the diminutive child, suggesting a reversal of typical authority dynamics—the small child holds the upper hand over the formally-dressed, presumably important adults. The humor relies on this size/power inversion common in period children's comics.