Life, 1929-07-05 · page 24 of 41
Life — July 5, 1929 — page 24: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page satirizes 1920s New York City's underdeveloped rooftops. The central illustration shows an elegant roof garden restaurant (the St. Regis Roof), contrasting with the text's complaint that Manhattan wastes valuable aerial real estate on "dirty roofs, chimneys and water tanks." The satirical sections mock futuristic dreams: "Sky-High Country Club" accessible by elevator, rooftop golf courses (where errant balls won't be "as dangerous as taxicabs"), and aerial neighborhoods replacing suburbs. "Air Minded" jokes about speakeasies at high altitudes during Prohibition. "The Higher Life" humorously suggests rooftop living might revive old-fashioned morality—the "modest old-fashioned girl on a bicycle" replacing the scandalous 1920s "flapper." The satire targets both urban planners (for neglecting rooftops) and contemporary social anxieties about modern manners and Prohibition enforcement. It's lighthearted futurism with Jazz Age social commentary.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
22 Len! ow op wi Lut fe ; Seen mbit: The Top of New York EW York City is very much like a college boy... it is developed everywhere but on top... its underground network is an engineering miracle, its streets and parks a matter of civic pride and its stores and buildings the finest in the world, but above it is a veritable waste- land of dirty roofs, chimneys and water tanks ...an undeveloped aerial desert worth millions, a lofty Sahara with only too few oases. Looking Upward Here is a great metropolis of six million people with less than a half dozen first-class roof gardens and per- haps a dozen roof bungalows «here are miles upon miles of real estate right in the heart of the city await- ing a pioneer with vision . why don’t our ar- chitectural geniuses get together and develop the top of Manhattan? .. this fair city should be crowned with aerial parks, roof gardens, coun- try homes and clubs and golf courses... why should an hour's drive be necessary to reach the great outdoors when it is quite possible to shoot skyward and reach the great updoors in a few minutes? ies Air Minded Had we progressed above in the past ten years as we have below, a man might now step into an elevator and reach the Sky-High Country Club in three minutes . . . think of the added time he might spend at the Nineteenth hole . . . think of the sporty courses he might play atop the town . . . sky. scraper tops would be connected by bridges and in place of water holes he would have street holes . . . this, of course, might be hard 01 the man be. low when a golfer dubbed his ball into the street, but after all golf balls are not as dangerous as taxicabs. The Upper Reaches How nice it would be if a man ould leave his upurban cottage, stroll acre a roof park, step into an elevator and be in his office in no time at all... picture the time when buildings will reach skyward far enough to be be yond the pale of prohibition . . . no more will it be necessary to go to Montreal or Bermuda or Europe . simply step into an express elevator and say to the operator “Full speed to Dinty Moore's!” The Higher Life Bermuda suggests the idea that vehicular traffic in this astral upburb might be restricted to bicycles and with the return of the two wheeler who knows but what there might be a revival of other old-fashioned things? . . . the rarified air might gO to the heads of our womenfolk and again we might sce the modest old-fashioned girl on a bi cycle built for two . . . the slat flapper with her rouge and “it” and vo de o do might disappear, the so ciety matron with her poli tics and advertising endorse- comicbooks.com