Life, 1928-11-02 · page 36 of 48
Life — November 2, 1928 — page 36: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page collects satirical commentary on contemporary American life circa early 20th century. **Main cartoons:** 1. **Motor-car accident**: A pedestrian hit by an early automobile quips "Well, 'oo 'asn't?" — mocking how common such accidents had become with the newfangled technology. 2. **Otto Kahn story**: Satirizes wealthy financier Otto H. Kahn's gambling habits, suggesting the ultra-rich bet casually on horse races in amounts ordinary people find shocking. 3. **Literary pretension ("Sidetracked")**: Mocks educated readers who own impressive classics (Dickens, Gibbon) but abandon them for cheap sensational fiction like "The Crimson Vulture" — criticizing shallow cultural consumption. 4. **Wife's disclaimer**: Jokes about men avoiding financial responsibility by having wives publicly renounce their debts in newspapers. The final cartoon about Mrs. Kangaroo appears purely whimsical. **Overall tone**: Gentle mockery of modern American excess, new technologies, class pretension, and frivolous reading habits.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
LIFE $$$ Our Foolishg$pi7~Contemporaries “Aut Scissors aut Nullus” SIDETRACKED My shelves are full of Dickens’ works, ‘And those of Thackeray and Scott; The books indorsed by learned clerks Are just the books that I have got. But sitting down, my gaze 1 bend Upon a plot that swiftly thickens In some new tale, and that’s the end Of Dickens. A handsome set of Gibbon’s **Rome,”* One of Balzac and one of Poe Adorn my small but cultured home And sit in an impressive row. To find a passage I explore, I mark it with a handsome ribbon, And yawn a bit, and then no more Of Gibbon, The greatest minds of every age Lie all within my easy reach, Their writings are profound and sage And I can cull the best of cach But man is weak; I idly cast A glance toward “The Crimson Vultwe.” Read the first page, and that’s the last Of Culture! —Loxpox Opinion. —S. K., in Spokane Spokesman-Review “Stop, stop! ve been run down by a motor-car!"* “Well, ‘oo *asn'1?"* |TO WHOM IT MAY A MILLIONAIRE PLAYS THE RACES CONCERN Tuy tell a story of Oto H. Kahn betting ten ~ - % So many men put dollars on a horse in the Kentucky Derby. “You aa pieces in the papers, - os og and pay for them, to mean, Mr. Kahn,’ asked a friend, “that you h her bet bigger amounts?” “No—I've got] ‘ the setiect, that od never bet bigg : Bo f \ shall no longer be money. ) / responsible for the —Harry Hershfield, New York Evening Journal pos ° debts of Mrs. So-and- J ( so,” that it seems POOR FATHER! hy 3 Z x; odd to us that no ~ ‘ wife ever inserts this liner: “Let's play “On and after this and Eve—you F day I shall refuse to me your epple : be responsible for the CU eat a. — se : OE idiosyncrasies of my —Lusrice Buirm We read of a rich man who used to give husband.” (Baus his guests on the Riviera money to gamble with. A Man of Parts —Detroit Free Press They must often have been sorely tempted to|Finsr Finst Prooucer: Murders very well, that keep it in their pockets. —Punch fellow, doesn't he? WHERE MOST OF THEM ARE = Stcon Fist Propucer: Yes, I shall be inter-|Puravecemtan (after house robbery): Boy, Potinics also makes strange students of the |ested to see how he commits suicide tomorrow. | down to the jail and get me a policeman! farm problem.—Detroit News —Brstaxptr (Loxvo). —New York Sus “He has three daughters and twa ” Weekly Paper. He's lucky to have as much as that with three daughters.—Humortst (London) Le < Ae. = V4 S> =<), ¥ -_o_~" MCA (] “Really, Mrs. Kangaroo, a pocket on the stomach is hardly elegant; why don't you carry a handbag?” —Le Rine (Pans). comicbooks.com