Life, 1928-09-28 · page 23 of 36
Life — September 28, 1928 — page 23: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page from *Life* satirizes American life during **Prohibition** (1920-1933), when alcohol sales were illegal. The "Another Mother Goose" poem parodies the nursery rhyme while cataloging the chaos of a Prohibition-era house party. "Hip-flasks" (hidden alcohol containers) replace the original's innocent items. The poem humorously lists the aftermath: drunk guests, muddled brains, throbbing pain—a pointed critique of how Prohibition drove drinking underground into private homes rather than eliminating it. The **"Golfing Dentist"** cartoon makes a separate joke: a dentist asks a patient to "open wider," but the visual context (unclear from description) likely contains wordplay or double meaning. The bus advertisement and other brief items add general humor about 1920s American life. The overall message: Prohibition created chaos and hypocrisy. Rather than reducing drinking, the law simply moved it behind closed doors where respectable families descended into drunken disorder—the opposite of what temperance advocates promised.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
LIFE Gour:nc Dentist (to the hole): Open a little wider, please. seat of quite a sensational mystery. so of a popular rum runner was ruins of a burned barn, and fear for whoever is responsible for his "Quite a number of our housewives ture stepped out for Al Smith as they say they're wel of having dry sleuths tracking up their @ Mr. and Mrs. Art Lark have returned fram their honeymoon. trip to Niagara Falls, Lark says the falls look just like the col- postcard pictures of the same, but that mariage is greatly overrated. 3 Kin Hubbard (Abe Martin) Tue Presivent of General Motors has come out for Hoover and Prohibition, That corporation scems to have an official for every purpose. Another Mother Goose Sino a song of hiccoughs, A pocket full of rye; Four and twenty hip-flasks Carried on the thigh. When the flasks were opened The guests began to roar; Now wasn’t that a pretty mess To set before the governess, The footman at the door, The butler, The waiter, The kitchen-maid and cook, The pantry, The ee bees The cozy breakfast nook, The Turkish rugs, The pewter mugs, The ts with wooden sails, The Duncan Phyfes That were your wife's, The lordly Chippendales, The wheeling halls, The waving walls, The neighbors at the door, The sliding chairs, the twisted stairs, The undulating floor— The darkness, The silence, The nurse beside the bed, The muddled brain, The throbbing pain, The ice-bag on the head: Now wasn’t that a pretty mess}— Well, that’s what Mother said. V. L. Owens. First Ratcroan Macnate: Business has been bad Jately. Stconp Ditto: Well, things should pick up right along now. Notre Dame starts its football season soon. NTRY clyene Tue Secret Is Out Eve Shows Adam the Tiny Garments COMPETITION IS NOT SO KEEN AT THE BALL PARK Wuen photographed and interviewed, the holder of first place in the line of men waiting for the tickets to go on sale for the first World's Series game gave out the following statement for publication: “I owe my present success to the many years of golf played on public links.” HEADLINER Juvce (to prisoner): Have you any- thing to say before I pronounce sentence upon you? Tue Prisoner: Yes. Please hurry it up. I want this to make the first edition of the morning papers. Bus Driver (fixing flat): Would you people mind coming out here and giving me a lift with this tire? comicbooks.com