The Wasp — 1887 — page 272: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This page is primarily **advertising**, not satirical content. It's the back cover of Volume 19, Number 16 of *The Wasp*, a San Francisco weekly costing 10 cents. The page features numerous commercial advertisements for local businesses: cigarette brands (Gypsy Queen, Old Judge, Straight Cut), liquor dealers, tailors, photographers, pharmacies, and other services. The only illustration with potential satirical intent appears to be an image in the "Carbolic Smoke Ball" advertisement—a man's face with what looks like medical/patent-medicine imagery—typical of late-Victorian quack remedy advertising that publications sometimes mocked. Otherwise, this represents standard period advertising revenue common to satirical publications.