Life, 1928-02-02 · page 37 of 38
Life — February 2, 1928 — page 37: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page satirizes the 1920s cultural obsession with finding an idealized "perfect woman." Life magazine humorously reports that seventeen prominent artists conducted a nationwide search for a young woman resembling the Venus de Milo—but "better-looking and more fun to take out." The satire targets several things: the absurdity of reducing women to physical measurements (listed precisely: collar size 13, calf 8⅛%), the winner's vapid response about California palms, and her contradictory claims to be "not much of a bookish girl" while casually mentioning field hockey, Princeton proms, and sophisticated dining—revealing shallow materialism masked as wholesomeness. The joke emphasizes how she spends her day steaming stamps off fan mail, underscoring that her "perfection" is purely decorative. Her admission that she smokes and drinks, while pretending concern about propriety, mocks the era's hypocritical standards for women's respectability. The accompanying ads (sausage, chewing gum) reinforce the commercialization of femininity being criticized.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
The Perfect Girl M R a prolonged, nation-wide search conducted by seventeen of America’s foremost artists in an attempt to find the young woman who most closely approximates the Venus de Milo but is better-looking and more fun to take out, the com- mittce has awarded the palm to Miss Marian Prindle, a student at the Otsego State University. Silver badges were given to Misses Harriet Crow and Edna Lasher for their excellent work in the competition, Miss Prindle, in receiving the palm, exclaimed: “What a beautiful palm! We have palms in Otsego, of course, but nothing like those in your beautiful California. This is the proudest day of my life!” After giving a brief interview to news- paper men, she spent the rest of the day sorting her mail and steaming the uncancelled postage stamps off some of the letters, Miss Prindle’s measurements, When Milo Jones, farmer, started Sausag INFZaN ANY Its friendly aid to teeth, appetite and diges- tion will help to keep the glow of health on little cheeks and on yours, too. “Co which are said by experts to be practically ideal for artists’ pur- poses, or anybody else’s, for that matter, are given below: Height, 5 ft. 5. Eyes, Blue. Born, 1907. Collar, 13. Calf, 81%. Number of watch case, 18807 Weight, 115. Hair, Chestnut. Occupation, Student. Cuffs, 61%. Calf (extended), 834. Neck, Yes. Wholesome, clean living and fre- quent cold showers after a brisk run, around the track are the factors to which Miss Prindle gives credit for her health and beauty. “I'm not | with her much of a bookish girl,” she ad- mitted to reporters. “But I like nothing better than a good, hard game of field hockey or a bid to the Princeton Prom. I eat almost any kind of rich, expensive food when dining out, and a small glass of sherry or an occasional pipe after dinner are my only dissipations. When I smoke, I open bedroom window, and no one is ever the wiser.” Miss Prindle is a typical vivacious, unspoiled girl, and popular not only fellows but with other girls’ fellows as well. She expects to graduate from Otsego this spring if she can pass that sordid trig- onometry exam., which she flunked last year with a 45. Norman R, Jaffray. read Life regularly — EVERY week! comicbooks.com