Life, 1928-11-23 · page 9 of 36
Life — November 23, 1928 — page 9: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This cartoon satirizes the ivory trade and elephant hunting in Africa. The image shows colonial hunters with rifles marking down an elephant—depicted as if "marking" it for future use as pool balls (billiard balls made from ivory). The caption "Marking Down Promising Ivory for Next Season's Pool Balls" is the satirical point: it treats the slaughter of elephants as a casual commercial enterprise, with hunters casually "shopping" for future materials. The exaggerated, comedic style of the drawing emphasizes how routine and unremarkable such hunting was to Western consumers who benefited from ivory products. The satire critiques both the exploitation of African wildlife and the detached commercialism of Western leisure culture.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
LIFE Z eee eee eee ee eee ago when somebody ‘gave him a break.” It probably strikes you funny that the funniest man in New York right now| knows how to cry. What struck me forcibly was that there is a man who “walks with kings” but still finds time to rub shoulders with smallies. It isn’t being done much lately, you know. The newest night club in town is the most inexpensive and it is packed with| merriment. It is called the Club Whoopee, on West 51st Street. There is no couvert charge. Chow mein sells for six bits (I swear!) and the staff of entertainers are swell gagmen. Jo-Jo, who used to be a singing waiter with Irving Berlin in Chinatown and at Coney, is there. So is Frank Wallace, a silvery-voiced warbler, and Lou Clayton and Jack Palmer, the songwriters, sing torrid ditties. The place is better described as “ta hot box” and it certainly is. When Tex Guinan came home she yipped at the Federal District Attorney that her favorite song was “The a Perfect D, A.,” and referring to |her stiff reception out on the coast she | said that states using capital punishment should make it more severe and change it to a four-week sentence in Hollywood, where Tex says even the snobs gather nightly to snub each other. WHERE DO YOU BUY IT, SIR? | Ravto Announcer: We will now have the dunner dince; er—er—the dunner dance orchestra; er—er—the danner dunce program; er—er—the dinner dunce; | ahem—er—the danner dance; er—er— ahem (takes deep breath), we will now have the dinner dance orchestra play a number of dinner dince selections; no, no, I mean danner dince selections; I mean I resign. Pierre Maclsaacs. Visitor: Those are nice dressing- rooms you have attached to the football stadium. Prortssor: Dressing-rooms? Those are the college buildings! Thanks Four hundred years ago and more, Columbus touched this Western shore: He'd been a very lucky fella, Thanks to the good ships “Pinta,” and “Santa Maria,” the courage of his men, and the gener- osity of Ferdinand and Isabella. About three hundred years from then, We won a war with Minute Men: In Liberty our land found solace, Thanks to Molly Pitcher, George Wash- ington, Paul Revere and the mistakes of General Cornwallis. Today, though skies be gray and murky, We're eating cranberries and turkey; In all the land, there’s celebration— Thanks to our high position in the worid, general prosperity, and the Presi- dent’s Thanksgiving Proclamation. Norman R. Jaffray. Women are after men, hammer and tongues! Everyoay Deeps THat Pass UNsuNnG Marking Down Promising Ivory for Next Season's Pool Balls comicbooks.com