Life, 1924-03-27 · page 22 of 36
Life — March 27, 1924 — page 22: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
**"Surfeited with Service"** by Don Herold satirizes American service industry excess in the early 20th century. Herold mocks railroad dining cars and hotels for creating unnecessary complexity—using multiple dishes to serve simple foods like grapefruit or baked apples, requiring constant handling and transfers between waiters. He argues this "ritualism" wastes food, breaks dishes, wears out servers' feet, and annoys travelers who simply want efficient service. The cartoon illustrates the absurdity: a diner facing an elaborate multi-dish presentation. Herold references H.G. Wells approvingly, noting that modern service prioritizes performance over practicality—restaurants employ "distribution stations" and endless fussing to appear upscale rather than serve customers well. The bottom cartoon, captioned "Child Labor Employer," appears unrelated—depicting an adult with children, suggesting employment of minors "keeps them out of mischief." The "Seven Wonders of the Theatrical World" appears to be a separate humorous list about Broadway's mysteries.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
And plecse don? COmplicie the chind QNL a than you Cf haw MOC! Surfeited with Service By Don Herold HE. spirit of the times is exempli fied in the number of dishes used to serve a grapefruit in a railroad dini car, Why st the hcials of a great railroad try to stick so. many dishes between me and my grapefrui Everywhere we go s ly is tryi to give us more service than is neces. sary You can no more ONE ¢ 1 baked apple . served honestly served in and straightforwardly in ONE dish, in a dining car first-class café you can—what is the old sayin fly Enough good baked-apple juice is lost annually by the unnecessary trans ier of baked apples from dish A to dish B in dining cars and cafés to sus of Patagonia, if there j the months of De cember nto March. January and February, and well These food czars want you to play a game with your victuals and move them from dish to dish like chess. Soup must be dipped hither and yon, ham and eggs must be derricked back and forth, even your toast must be sneaked from Such Jer a helmet ritualism wears out waite dishes, and wears out f wears ou This fetehi 1 carr of surplus dishes is largely responsible for the appalling number of broken arches am. ro waiters. Twill wager that actual call tests would show an annual wear of 014 inch on those in termediary dishes which might as well t think be left in’ the kitchen, and ju what that means years, The forms of surplus service LIFE - . too. in the course of ten traveler is annoyed with other A man on the road gets whisk-broomed on an average of ten times a day he turns there Wherever is somebody wai zy to give him three or four whisks that he In one N has sp doesn't need. at least there service pest when you have a white-apre w York b up tel a new med girl who, ascertained from the YOU SEE, room clerk the room number of some one you wish to ‘phone from the lobby steps in front of you as you re for of the several phones near the desk dl says, “Sha course the is too old to complain about H. G. Wells and | same about these matters. He “Men that the idea is not really service but it feel much the says in Like G Too many midd to stick distribution st or whisk-brooms or s tween us and the objects I should like to see a ch. folks would let me le, 1 know avelers I wish fer hard. it would American more ships. For exa be healthful for dining cars to have the kitchen and get their own food, maybe, have and help do the dinner dishes. dinner, to go The Seven Wonders of the (Theatrical) World 2. The number of new plays nut her of leased theatres. 3. The number of ESSE, r of failures nber of speculators 6. The number of “boobs.” 7. “Abie's Irish Rose Str Yorns, MISCHIEF, IT KEEPS THEM OUT OF comicbooks.com