Captain Billy's Whiz Bang, March 1921 · page 28 of 68
Captain Billy's Whiz Bang #18 — page 28: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page from *Whiz Bang*, a 1920s humor magazine, collects humorous reader letters and responses. The satire targets Prohibition-era anxieties: **Main jokes:** - Simple puns compare babies to animals (cow, seagull) - The extended "keep husband home" advice sarcastically describes making illegal homemade alcohol (fusel oil fermentation). The solution: get him drunk at home instead of at speakeasies—a darkly comic commentary on Prohibition's failure - References Eva Tanguay, a popular vaudeville singer - Final joke: a heavy drinker admits quitting alcohol feels interminable, humorously admitting he can't sustain sobriety **Context:** Published during Prohibition (1920-1933), *Whiz Bang* regularly mocked the law's impracticality, openly joking about bootlegging and home alcohol production while mainstream publications couldn't. The pseudonymous readers likely weren't real—these were editorial jokes presenting common contemporary complaints about enforced sobriety.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
26 Captain Billy's Whiz Bang Dear Skipper Bill—What's the difference between a cow and a baby?—**Dunn O. Nuttin.** Well, a cow drinks water to make milk, while a baby just drinks milk. * * * Dear Captain Billy—How can I keep my husband home at night?—**Worried Newlywed.** Take five pounds of fusel oil, two pounds of prunes and one pound of raisins, put it in a five gallon crock. Then for nine dreary evenings,, sit beside the crock and gently lift up the cheesecloth cover and hold com-munion therewith. It will sing a song to you in peculiar fashion, reminding you of the olden days when you put the parlor sea shell to your ear to hear the wild waves roar. You'll hear Eva Tanguay sing-ing “I Don't Care.” When the tenth day has come to pass, strain the contents of the crock into bottles and then you can telephone your husband's drug store and tell him to come home. You should have no further trouble in retaining his company. * * * Dear Captain—What's the difference between a sea gull and a baby?—**Flipflop Flapper.** A sea gull flips along the shore, while a baby slips along the floor. * * * Dear Skipper Bill—Don't you think that giving up drinking will assure a longer life?—**Repentant Soak.** Perhaps you're right. I once gave it up for 24 hours and it was the longest day I ever lived.