Life, 1927-04-07 · page 20 of 59
Life — April 7, 1927 — page 20: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains three satirical pieces from *Life* magazine: **"The Great Natator"**: A one-liner joke mocking a California schoolboy's garbled knowledge of history. He confuses Columbus with a swimmer, using offensive ethnic slur ("wop") and nonsensical geography. The satire targets educational gaps and regional stereotypes. **"Harvard vs. Yale"**: A mock radio broadcast where a football game is replaced entirely with trivia questions—testing knowledge of Vermont counties, the 1896 electoral vote, Madagascar's political status. The satire skewers the intellectual pretension of Ivy League schools, suggesting their "big game" rivalry is really about academic oneupmanship rather than athletics. **"The Sparring Exhibition"**: Young women claim different weights to different audiences, each adjusting expectations for their male suitors. The satire critiques female vanity and dishonesty in romantic contexts—a common theme in period humor. The page also includes a ship diagram captioned about passenger demands for outside cabins forcing novel apartment-house-like designs—architectural satire on luxury travel.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
The Great Natator Teacher: TELL ME WHAT YOU KNOW ABOUT COLUMBUS, California Boy: We WAS THE WOP THAT WON THE SWIM FROM SPAIN TO SALVADOR ISLAND, Harvard vs. Yale (Radio play-by-play report of The Big (Intelligence) Game—and it won't be long now, dearie.) W SLL, folks, you have just lis- tened to the Hawaiian Vocal Trio render “My Old Kentucky Home” on the ophone, cymbals, harp and harmonica, and if you will just stand by a few seconds we will connect you with Cambridge, Mas- sachusetts, where the Big Blue team from Yale, down in New Haven, is clashing with the Big Crimson team, representing Harvard. Stand by, this is Station QUIZ....Good after- noon, folks, this is Professor Albert Einstein announcing the Big Game. Well, the te are on the field now and are getting their instructions from Nick Butler, the referee. Larry Lowell of Harvard and Jim Angell of Yale are the linesmen and —there they go, there they go!... Wow, but that was a hot one, folks— Yale kicked off with the question as to what 7-Gtths would be if reduced to decimals. There was a bad fumble but another Harvard man fell on the ball with the correct answer of -109375....Hope you've all got your pocket Britannicas handy, folks, be- cause this is going to be some game. «.-They’re off again!...Hear that cheering? Harvard wanted to know the clectoral vote for President in 1896 and Yale was penalized—I mean penalized—for taking time out looking up the answer, which, of course, is Republican 271, Demo- cratic 176. Yale now has the ball in the shadow of its own goal posts and boots a high one with “Name the counties of Vermont.” But—look at that, look at that! Listen to that Harvard man go! “Addison, Ben- nington, Caledonia, Chittenden, Es- sex, Franklin, Grand Isle, Lamoille, Orange, Rutland, Washington, Wind- ham, Windsor.” It's over, it’s over! -No, they're bring- —he forgot to name Orleans County. Well, that was too bad, folks, because he was going like a house afire and had a clear field ahead of him....Harvard's ball on Yale’s twelve-yard line and—it's a fake—it’s a fake. And the ball is over! Gee whiz, that was certainly a beauty, folks. Harvard asked the principal industry of the republic of Madagascar and Yale fell all over itself trying to answer. It isn’t a republic at all, folks, it’s a French possession! Well, that gives Har- vard the game, and it certainly was a wonderful game, so stand by now for the rest of the program from Station QUIZ, which is now putting on an hour of Bedtime Stories for Night Watchmen. Tip Bliss. The Sparring Exhibition HEY meet. They shake hands, They step back. “My weight is one hundred and eight and a half pounds,” says the first. “Mine is one hundred and thir- teen,” says the second. “That much?” protests the first. “IT know I'll m one hundred and five next week,” says the sec- ond. “That's what I'll week,” s the first. And so the two young ladies go to their respective corners to await their young men, who think each is just the right weight. make next ig ELEN: Why are about the opera “Luci: Irene: appeal. Because it has sextette THE INSISTENCE OF PASSE GERS ON OUTSIDE ROOMS MAY FORCE THE BUILDING OF SHIPS WITH ZONES AND A COURT ON THE ORDER OF APARTMENT HOUSES. comicbooks.com