Life, 1926-12-09 · page 27 of 45
Life — December 9, 1926 — page 27: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This humorous article by Don Herold satirizes post-WWI urban dissatisfaction. The author, disgusted with both Manhattan and its suburbs, proposes living in Pennsylvania Station as a mock-serious solution to New York's residential problems. The joke relies on **absurdist logic**: the station offers "wide open spaces" (the main terminal), convenience to trains for escaping west, proximity to subways for going to New York, entertainment (watching crowds), and amenities (clocks, phones, running water, drugstores). He even suggests his wife could shop there and his daughter play—treating a railroad terminal as an actual home. The cartoon below shows a woman at a telephone, likely representing the absurdity of such arrangements. The satire mocks 1920s urban alienation and housing frustrations by proposing the ridiculous as practical, thereby critiquing how genuinely inadequate actual New York living options had become for many residents.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
A Good Place to Live in New York By Den Herold Af! R trying any number of resider and around New York City for finding none of ther isfactory, I bel thought of a place in which I should like to li It is the Pennsylvani tion, I have just application to the officials of the Pennsylvania Railroad and asked them if they will accept inc as a roomer, or paying guest, in their New York terminal. I have hinted that I should like them to accommodate my wife and five-year-old girl, too, because I think the station would be a convenient place for my wife to shop and a nice place for my little girl to play, but if they do not want to take in my family I ill come alone. ‘The family isa detail on which I shall not insist. locations in For some time I have been outlining in my own mind the advantages of the Pennsyl- vania Station as a_ residential possibility, and they are indeed alluring. In the first place, I feel that the Pennsylvania Station in it- self will offer me all the wide- that my nature will ever need. I can step out into the middle of that great central room and bend my neck upwards and breathe deep and look at the maps of the world around the walls and get all of God's great out-of-doors that I shall ever want. No other p! with the e Central open spaces in New York, eption of Grand tion, is so conveni- ent at the same time to the city and the suburbs, though I am equally disgusted with the city Now ATWATER TELL ae” ME~WwHaT Do TWO AND ONE MAKE? THE SMART SET 25 and the suburbs and hope I shall never have to see either of them again. (One should be able to live without ever having to see much of the suburbs or of the city either.) There is plenty of room for long walks, and I might even make ar- rangements for horseback rides. If I should ever hare to go out West, I would be right there con- venient to the trains. If I should ever have to go to New York, I would be convenient to the subway If my relatives should ever come to visit me they could stop at a near- by hotel at night and come over and sit with me in the waiting room in the daytin I understand the table- board is very good. There are plenty of large clocks by which to tell time, plenty of telephones, hot and cold running water, good heat and light, and there is good porter service. And I should have, virtually right in my own room, a drug store, book store, fruit store, ete. Furthermore, the situation would throw me into con- tact with some of the best people. I hope the Pennsylvania Railroad officials will, if they are unwilling to turn one of the larger rooms over to me, at least allow me to put a cot in one corner of the station somewhere. I will exchange references. SCIENTIST says that Mars has a mean tempera- ture of 68 and springtime the year round. So Mars has started a Chamber of Commerce! Yuletide Problem A KIDDIE car for Betty and a radio for Ben, A runabout for Hetty, and for Joe a fountain pen, A silver set for Mother and a check or two, of course, And I can't forget my brother or the office force. A quart, perhaps, of this or that for old Judge Blam, Who went so nobly to the bat when Twas in a jam. The weather, too, is turning wet, the damp and cold, And I have simply got to get my shoes half-soled. ALM. S., Jr. streets are MNERVIEY Nobody’s Business HE: What's the best way to keep a New Year's resolu- tion? He: To yourself. comicbooks.com