Life, 1926-01-28 · page 25 of 36
Life — January 28, 1926 — page 25: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page from *Life* magazine contains three satirical pieces circa 1925: **Top cartoon**: A radio malfunction forces a family to endure someone reading extremely complex arithmetic problems aloud as entertainment—mocking both the tedium of early radio programming and people's desperation for any content. **Left column**: A dialogue satirizing well-meaning charity. A philanthropist redirects donations: old clothes to Near East Relief, books/magazines to the Salvation Army, old pen points to the Post Office. The joke is the absurd specificity and the implication that charitable organizations will accept anything, no matter how useless. **Bottom cartoon**: "Madame Bunco" (a transparent fake-spiritualist name) takes her pet table outside for "an airing." This mocks spiritualist mediums of the 1920s—Madame Bunco relies on a trick table (likely rigged for séance fraud) so obviously it needs literal maintenance like a pet. All three pieces target 1920s social follies: gullible consumers, dubious charities, and fraudulent spiritualism.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
Radio Fan: BOOK Next of Kin ALET: What shall I do with this old clothing, sir? Puitanturorist: Give it to the Near East Relief. Vater: magazines? PHILANTHROPIST: Army. Vatet: And_ shall these old pen points? Puitantnrorist: No. Give 'em to the Post Office Department. And these old books and The Salvation I throw away Simple Arithmetic bs WO hundred and seventy-five mil- lion, eleven hundred and forty- three thousand, hundred six, twenty-eight billion, two hundred sixty- nine million, fifty-five, plus thirty-seven million, six hundred and ninety-nine thousand four hundred forty-four and eleven million, four hundred thousand and fifty-three billion, twenty-eight million, eleven hundred thirteen and thirty-five million two hundred twenty- four divided by ninety-two thousand, three hundred fifty-seven minus eleven million, twenty-three thousand times two IT'S ALL RIGHT; COME ON IN. THE RADIO'S BUSTED, SO HELEN'S READING MR SELECTIONS FROM Caller: WHAT ON EARTH ———! HER COOK VE GOT TO HAVE MY EVENING PROGRAM SOMEHOW "t what Merely a word pic- is 1925 nN, fifty-six ion, three hundred th No, Gentle Reader, that i you thought it was. ture of Henry income tax. IF three mi seventy-seven thousa sixty-three plus two hundred hundred ion, forty-seven t comp cigh' sixty-seven four thousand, — eleven hundred twenty-one and seven- “(OSH, I’ve got a cinder in my eye!” teen thousand forty-nine.” “Goody, maybe it’s anthraci | Nh ys) MADAME BUNCO, THE FAMOUS MEDIUM, TAKES HER PET TARLE OUT FOR AN ATRING comicbooks.com