Life, 1927-12-08 · page 3 of 40
Life — December 8, 1927 — page 3: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This is primarily a **Timken Roller Bearings advertisement**, not political satire. The image shows a stylized 1920s scene with a fashionable woman and three automobiles of different eras, illustrating automotive progress. The ad's humor is gentle and commercial: it suggests that car buyers don't care about technical bearing specifications—they just want reliability ("settled"). The satire is self-directed: Timken admits customers aren't interested in mechanical details, only results. The "Timken-equipped" designation serves as reassurance that complex engineering has been handled for them. The flapper-style woman and period cars date this to the 1920s, when automobiles were becoming consumer goods and marketing increasingly targeted style-conscious buyers rather than mechanically-minded owners.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
Trug, one may not be interested in mechan- ical questions—only in having them settled! Endurance? Quiet? Economy? Speed? Modern design? That's settled when the salesman says “Timken-Equipped.” Then friction, side-thrust, radial load, torque and all those matters are indeed of no further concern to you. Timken Bearings are your complete protection against ALL these forms of wear. Only Timkens! Because only Timkens combine Timken POSITIVELY ALIGNED ROLLS, Timken tapered construction, and Timken electric steel. Make it your first point to know that you are buying Timken-equipped. THE TIMKEN ROLLER BEARING CO., CANTON, 0. TIMKE pate LIFE Published Weekly by Life Pub, Co., $08 Madison Ave_ N-Y.N. Y. Subeoription, $5100, Vol 00, No, 2 a7. Fat'd av tnd C ine Mater OfSee, under act of March 3. 1579. Printed in U.S.A. Ent'd as 20d Class Matter at the Post Otice PENG oe 1927, Life Pub, Co., i