Life, 1926-12-02 · page 20 of 81
Life — December 2, 1926 — page 20: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This 1920s satire by Marc Connelly mocks overwrought radio personalities who wrap xenophobic and Prohibition-era messaging in false piety. The fictional Mrs. Charles Hippley Gurd delivers a Christmas sermon blaming "evil un-American influences" and "bootlegger-controlled newspapers" for destroying American institutions—a common trope of that era's anti-immigrant, anti-alcohol crusaders. The accompanying cartoon joke shows a young couple; the caption reveals his fiancée insisted he "bundle up well," a mundane domestic exchange highlighting the contrast between the radio broadcast's grandiose moral panic and ordinary life. The satire targets how radio personalities exploited patriotic and religious sentiment to promote Prohibition and nativist anxieties. For modern readers: this reflects 1920s moral panic over immigration, organized crime linked to bootlegging, and the anxiety about preserving "American" values—concerns that sound familiar but were specifically tied to that era's enforcement of alcohol prohibition.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
Ghristmas JT, 7 fe umber cA ‘Radio Nosegay Some Christmas Blossoms to Be Culled by Moving Your Dials Ever So Slightly By eMarc Connelly nw on our special Christmas Day program ree will be Mrs. Charles Hippley Gurd, who will give her Christmas talk on ‘Brotherhood—Its Limits.” Mrs. Gurd will take the microphone, ...A Merry Christ- mas to you all, dear friends of Radioland. I hope you have all had as happy a Christmas Day as I have had. It has indeed been a beautiful day, but as I stand here now, 1 wonder how many of you realize that the spirit of Christmas, that is, the old-fashioned Christmas, is fast fading from our country which was founded for the safety of American institutions, institutions our fathers and forefathers lived and dicd for, but which, we must sooner or later all realize, are fast being destroyed and ruined torous and loathsome creatures who are trying to engulf our body politic in the mire of the illegal liquor trafhi It seems to me that now is the time for every God-fearing patriot, and I know I am talking to hundreds of thousands who want to be real patriots but find it almost impossible to get at facts because of the wicked bootlegger-controlled newspapers that are allowing our American institutions to be dese- erated by evil un-American influences—why—now is the MIS FIANCEE TOLD HIM TO BUNDLE UP WELL. time for the real patriot to take on himself the task of secing that our laws are respected, that every offender is put in jail where he belongs, whether he be rich or poor, and that the vision which guided our Congress to pass the finest law ever executed by man, namely, the Volstead Act, is... ++snext number of our Special Christy Jollity Program, by courtesy of the James F. Werty Brush Company, man- ufacturers of the famous Toothfit Dental Brushes, the Kleankwik Nail Brushes and ellento | Hair Brushes, in connection with the twenty-second anni- versary of the building of the James F, Werty plants in Trenton and Paterson, will be one of your favor- ites, Smiling Billy Milch. His first number will be the Laughing Song... .Smiling Billy Mileh,...Oh, it’s ha, ha, ha, and ho, ho, ho, and it’s hee, hee... .+-know you will be glad to hear the Rev. Dr. Daniel Finger again this evening. Dr. Finger, as Presi- dent of the League for the Eradica- tion of Civic Evils, brings us a mes- sage of great interest....Dear, dear friends, as our thoughts turn to- night to the solemn thoughts of the happenings in a little city in the far- off Holy Land, I wonder how many of us appreciate the blessings of keeping our own cities free of the criminal elements that Europe is Small Brother: say, 818, CAN 1 HANG UP ONE OP YOUR STOCKINGS CHRIST- throwing upon our shores to en- MAS EVE? danger the calm and tranquillity of Big Sister: WuAT ON EARTH DO YOU WANT TO HANG UP ONE our beloved republic. I wonder how OF MINE FoR? many of you realize that every year Small Brother: so’s t CAN SEE WHAT 1 GOT WITHOUT GETTING our cities open their arms to many OUT OF BED. (Continued on page 75) comicbooks.com