Judge — September 27, 1919

# "The World's Best Stories" Advertisement This page is primarily a **book advertisement** rather than political satire. It promotes a four-volume collection titled "The World's Best Stories" containing 1,260 stories of wit and humor. The advertisement emphasizes the collection's practical value for business professionals and social situations. It references **Abraham Lincoln's famous use of humorous anecdotes** as persuasive tools, suggesting witty stories can close business deals and win arguments more effectively than logic alone. The left image shows two businessmen in an office setting, apparently illustrating how storytelling functions in professional contexts. The ad promises stories from diverse origins—Scotch, Italian, Hebrew, Darky, and Irish traditions—reflecting early 20th-century categorizations of humor by ethnicity. The collection includes 81 prize-winning stories selected from international competitions, bound in cloth with gold stamping.

# Analysis of Judge Magazine Cover, September 27, 1919 This satirical cartoon, titled "The Third Party or 'The World Is Too Much With Us,'" depicts a grotesque caricatured figure with exaggerated features, goggles, and patched clothing sitting with two well-dressed women. The figure appears to represent a disheveled or disreputable character intruding where he doesn't belong. The "Third Party" reference likely alludes to emerging political movements or social disruptions of 1919—a year marked by labor strikes, the Red Scare, and postwar social upheaval in America. The cartoon satirizes unwelcome intrusion into polite society, suggesting anxieties about radical or working-class elements threatening established social order. The refined women's discomfort underscores Judge's conservative editorial stance against perceived threats to respectable American life.

# Analysis of "Any Club When Smoking Is No Longer Permitted" This F. Foster Lincolm cartoon satirizes the social consequences of anti-smoking restrictions. The drawing depicts a gentleman's club or similar exclusive establishment rendered nearly empty and gloomy—with only a handful of dejected men scattered throughout what should be a lively social space. The satire's point: prohibiting smoking would devastate men's clubs by eliminating the primary activity and social ritual that attracted members. The sparse, melancholy atmosphere suggests that without cigarettes and cigars, these establishments would lose their appeal entirely. This reflects early-20th-century debates over smoking restrictions, when such bans were viewed as threats to established male social institutions and leisure culture. The cartoon argues smoking prohibitions would render these spaces pointless and abandoned.

# "Same Old Story" by Foster Ware This page combines a satirical cartoon with a short story. The cartoon depicts a crowded dance floor with well-dressed figures in energetic, somewhat chaotic motion. The caption reads: "Don't you think young Jones is progressing in his dancing?" / "Yes, by leaps and bounds." The joke is visual wordplay: Jones is literally leaping and bounding around the dance floor in an ungainly manner, making "progressing in his dancing" a humorous contradiction. The cartoon mocks awkward dancers who move erratically rather than gracefully. Below is Foster Ware's story about a respectable citizen named Jones who, despite his upright reputation, secretly desires a drink and visits soda counters to order cocktails disguised as soft drinks—satirizing Prohibition-era hypocrisy about alcohol consumption.

# Page 6 Analysis This page contains three distinct pieces: **Top section**: A humorous story about Jones, a man arrested for drunk and disorderly conduct. The joke pivots on Jones claiming he hasn't been drinking, yet the Judge sentences him to 30 days anyway—the Judge remarking that Jones "didn't look like a drinking man," suggesting his unkempt appearance made him appear guilty regardless. **Left illustration** (by Caesar Smith): Depicts a domestic scene with the caption "Huh! I didn't know he was strong enough to hold sister! Daddy said he was a poor weak fish!" This appears to satirize courtship or engagement, mocking a man's apparent weakness. **Right section**: "The Motor-bus Bo," a humorous poem by Richard Brinsley Glanzer satirizing the arrogance of motor-bus riders who consider themselves superior to pedestrians, treating walking people contemptuously.

# "A Corporal" - Judge Magazine Satire This page satirizes the U.S. Army corporal rank, written by a former corporal from the American Expeditionary Forces (WWI era). The humor targets the corporal's impossible position: responsible for squad discipline and logistics yet blamed for everything—whether the squad misbehaves or performs well. Key absurdities highlighted: the corporal stretches meager rations (one jam can across seven men's three meals), distributes chewing tobacco by measured bites, and absorbs blame from all directions. He's simultaneously mother, father, nurse, and scapegoat. Ironically, while essential to squad function, he receives no real authority—a buck private can outrank him in reality. The accompanying cartoons illustrate the chaos: one shows domestic disruption; another depicts a run-down pedestrian—visual gags about collateral damage from military hierarchy. The satire reflects post-WWI soldier frustration with rank absurdities and the corporal's thankless middle-management position.

# "Renting Your House" — A Satirical Comic Strip This is a humorous multi-panel comic depicting a woman inspecting a house for rental. The satire targets the poor condition of rental properties and landlords' negligence. The woman (depicted with exaggerated fashion) discovers successive problems: loose floorboards, small grounds, a deteriorating veranda, missing electricity, damaged paint and floorboards, low ceilings, and finally water stains suggesting a roof leak and mold. The joke is that each defect she identifies is dismissed or minimized—the landlord/inspector responds with excuses rather than acknowledgment. By the final panel, she demands "a thorough overhauling," highlighting the absurdity of renting a dilapidated property. This satirizes early 20th-century housing standards and the powerlessness of renters facing slumlord conditions.

# Analysis for Modern Readers This page contains **two separate pieces of satire**: ## Top Cartoon A simple joke about taxi overcharging: two people read a newspaper account of a robbery victim asking "How much did the chauffeur charge him?"—implying taxi drivers are as predatory as criminals. ## "Recipes from Our Operatic Cook-Book" The main satire uses **cooking metaphors to mock opera world stereotypes**. Harvey Peake ridicules: - **Prima Donnas**: vain, manipulated divas who become "jealous" and temperamental - **Leading Tenors**: egotistical, needing constant praise to stay "swelled" - **Conductors**: volatile, requiring careful handling to avoid "spoiling" - **Impresarios**: exploitative, boiling singers together for profit The satire targets **vanity, temperament, and commercialism** in early 20th-century opera. By treating performers as ingredients to be "prepared," Peake suggests they're interchangeable commodities—mocking the pretension of "high art" while revealing its business-driven reality. The bottom joke about late vegetables similarly mocks urban disconnection from reality.

# Analysis of Judge Magazine Page This page contains several satirical pieces mocking American life circa 1920s: **"De Luxe Market" cartoon**: Two women enter a fancy store; one quips they'll "get robbed together"—satire on inflated prices at upscale shops. **"How It Happened"**: A rural Arkansas man describes visiting a town where chaos erupted (fights, runaways, fire, airplanes)—mocking modern urban life's frenetic pace as dangerous and exhausting. **"The Dream of Abou Ben Adam"**: A man tries convincing an angel he deserves tax exemption through virtue (church, sobriety, gambling abstinence), but fails. When he mentions housekeeping and his wife working, the angel finally approves—satire on how women's labor suddenly became valuable for taxation purposes, likely referencing recent women's suffrage. **"Suffrage Wins"**: A husband now studies politics to discuss intelligently with his wife—mocking how male authority shifted with women's voting rights. The remaining pieces are light humor about dogs and bridge card games.

# "Forgetting" by Walt Mason (Judge Magazine) This page presents a humorous essay-poem arguing that willful forgetfulness is the path to contentment. The illustration shows a fat, cheerful man sitting atop a pile of money, playing a lyre while a thin, anxious figure gestures in agitation beside him. The satire targets early 20th-century American anxieties: political corruption ("statesmen are disgusting"), economic instability ("the government is busting"), and apocalyptic worrying ("things are bound to burst"). Mason's speaker advocates deliberate indifference—refusing to dwell on betrayals (a man named Bill Wax swindled him), government scandals, or neighbors' panic. The joke is the contrast between active fretting and passive comfort. While others sweat and worry about coming chaos, the protagonist remains "fat and sassy" by simply choosing not to care. The illustration emphasizes this: prosperity through selective amnesia versus anxiety-ridden poverty. It's escapist satire mocking both pessimistic doomsayers and the speaker's own complacent hedonism.

# "Guy From the City" - Judge Magazine Comic This is a multi-panel comic satirizing wealthy college students visiting poor relatives. Rich college cousins arrive to "entertain" their scraggly country cousins with promises of fun. The visiting students are depicted as vain and self-important—boasting about college football teams and their own superiority—while treating their rural relatives as entertainment subjects rather than genuine family. The humor relies on class contrast: the well-dressed, confident city students condescend to their shabby country counterparts, who respond with bewilderment and their own crude antics (rough behavior, poor manners). The final panel references "Charlie" appearing "as a Peace Commissioner" next week, suggesting this series continues. The satire mocks both groups—the snobbish pretense of wealthy college youth and the backwardness stereotypically attributed to rural Americans in early 20th-century popular culture.

# "The Man Behind the Medals" This is the opening of a short story (not a political cartoon) satirizing post-WWI American high society. The illustration shows an Italian military aviator, Captain Antonio Diamondi, being introduced to fashionable society by Mrs. Josephus Ingham-Gordon, a wealthy woman involved in war charities. The satire targets the pretentiousness of the wealthy elite: despite their patriotic war work, they are primarily motivated by social climbing and status. The story suggests that society women are impressed by the captain's decorations and romantic foreign accent, while the Ingham-Gordons perform patriotic duties to maintain social standing. The text explicitly notes that "aspirants to society mingled with the elect in good deeds, but not absolutely in good faith"—exposing wartime charity as performative rather than genuinely altruistic. The broader point appears to be critiquing how the upper class weaponized patriotism for social advancement during and after WWI.