Life, 1926-08-05 · page 27 of 41
Life — August 5, 1926 — page 27: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
The top cartoon satirizes small-town boosterism and historical revisionism. A traveling salesman discusses "Jonesville's" upcoming centennial celebration with a hotel clerk. The joke: the town manipulates its age (claiming it's older than it actually is) the same way it inflates its population figures—through creative accounting. The salesman suggests the celebration include nostalgic events like recreating old-fashioned meals, and jokingly proposes executing the inventor of the modern "coffee shoppe waffle" (a contemporary chain restaurant innovation he despises). The satire targets early 20th-century American small towns' tendency to manufacture heritage and celebrate "progress" while simultaneously romanticizing a disappearing past. It mocks both commercialization of tradition and the traveling salesman culture itself—a common subject in Life's humor during this era.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
THE CALL OF THE WILD Jonesville’s Anniversary “J SEE you're going to have a I centennial,” remarked the gray- haired traveling salesman to the clerk in the Hotel New Trianon, for- merly the Smith House, Jonesville. “Every town fi ars old ought to have its centennial; then, in another or so, it can have a sesqui. By figuring its age the same way it estimates its population, Jonesville can he old enough to let the fast g married sect of the town feel ‘olonial. hen I first started making Jonesville thirty years ago, long be- fore the Mastodon Hotels Corpora- tion bought this house from old Eph Smith and installed the State’s first coffee shoppe, the town was about twenty-five years old. So it'll be good and ripe for a centennial in another year. “I wish if you're talking to any members of the Centennial Commit- tee you'd suggest that a feature of the celebration should be Old Smith House Day, with Mrs. Eph Smith instalied in’ the New Trianon kitchen to turn out a memorial meal, one of the kind they uscd to sell for fifty cents. Another fine event on the program would be the execution in the public square of the inventor of the modern coffee shoppe waffle, if he hasn't fled the country. “If those numbers are on the pro- gram I'll certainly come to Jones- ville during the centennial and bring a special trainload of members of the traveling men’s association.” McCready Huston. War-Torn “TS Florida expecting many tour- ists next a “Cer s planning to adver- tise last 's battle grounds.” Bandit: 1’M FED UP ON DESE NEWS SHEETS, DEY’RE GETTIN’ T’BE NUT- TIN’ BUT TRADE PAPERS! The Sport of the Thing OXING championships are won in the ring and lost in the movies. oe ® When they are knocked down and in danger of losing their tempers, some fighters find it an excellent practice to count ten before they arise, ee @ Ringside spectators are nearly all gluttons for punishment. ee Managers are the patriotic manu- facturers of warfare in the ring. The more fighting there is, the greater their profit. ** # There may be nothing significant in the fact, yet it is worthy of notice that you never see a boxing pro- moter wearing a cauliflower ear. oat The voice of the people is the voice of the gallery gods. ** # Nowadays, champions do their road work in limousines. James Kevin McGuinness. Flapper Flippancy NE-half of me would be a saint, The other half a sinner; And I will utter no complaint, Whichever part's the winner. comicbooks.com