Life, 1923-10-04 · page 43 of 44
Life — October 4, 1923 — page 43: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This is not political satire but rather a **corporate advertisement** for Western Electric, makers of telephone equipment. The page explains—with detailed photographs and diagrams—how precious metals (gold, silver, and platinum) are essential components in telephone technology. The opening quip ("Speech is silvern, silence is golden") is a pun on the proverb, used to justify why gold actually appears in phones. The content demonstrates how these metals improve electrical transmission, prevent corrosion, and enable the mechanical contacts that route calls through switchboards. The accompanying illustration of a miner appears to be purely decorative, evoking the "raw materials" theme stated at the bottom. This is a technical marketing piece aimed at educating readers about manufacturing quality—essentially saying: your telephone is as finely crafted as jewelry, justifying both its cost and reliability.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
‘ GOLDEN CUP PRETTY COSP- CAKES: Nothing LY VOICECUL- : light about these TURE: Pouring kes of solid gold, the mixture of | | " The jars contain pre- platinum, gold . metal too— gold and silver which | central jar and is to play apart | | L gold and platinum : in telephone con- a partic! in the other ~in your telephone °:%=""" : particles the other old telephones at a saving of many t! sand dollars a y ‘CQ PEECH is silvern, silence is golden’, says the adage— but you can’t get the men who made your telephone to be- lieve it. They know that gold in the tele- phone assists in the perfect transmission It is a fact that a mixture of gold, silver Ab: A feature ot and platinum is used in this instrument. So able to the tele- fine are the materials and careful the work- To resist corrosion : * id wear—and manship that you would think a telephone Keep smooth the 2 : > path of the voice some masterpiece of the jeweler’s art. currents, But if you consider its strength of con- struction and remarkable lasting quality, your telephone seeins as though hammered | . ; =| out on a blacksmith’s forge! : Western Efecfric Since 1869 makers of electrical equipment No. 5 of a series on raw materials. | | | | | | J) ] DRAWING THE METAL INTO WIRE: This process is helped by the high degree of ductility of platinum—an inch cube of which could be drawn into a thread encir- cling the globe twice at the equator. | | | | _J HERE IT IS! The two points on the upright springs are the : e ) Jf precious metal. Every time you IN SWITCHBOARD LAMPS, TOO. With the take the receiver off the hook, help of gold and platinum wires, these tiny lights Hi v these springs move to the left flash your signal to the operator. e use of r til the points make contact—a platinum means a tight seal between the glass path over which the voice cur- and the lead-in wires. rents travel, comicbooks.com