Captain Billy's Whiz Bang, December 1921 · page 55 of 68
Captain Billy's Whiz Bang #28 — page 55: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page from the satirical magazine contains several brief humor pieces reflecting early 20th-century American attitudes: **"We Expect a Free Can For This!"** jokes about a bashful girl requesting a female clerk to buy Arbuckle's coffee—implying embarrassment about commercial transactions, playing on period gender conventions. **"The Happy Ham"** is a pun: smokers become "inured" (accustomed) to vice, but a "ham" (amateur actor or showoff) can be "cured" through smoking—a wordplay on food preservation. **The automobile joke** reflects anxiety about unmarried couples unchaperoned in cars—a modern dating concern of the era. **"The old inhabitant" piece** nostalgically contrasts modern women's looser clothing with stiffly starched petticoats that announced a lady's presence audibly—lamenting changing fashion and social propriety. **"Naughty Egg"** is crude bathroom humor about a child getting splattered. The page demonstrates typical satirical magazine content: wordplay, social commentary on changing morality, and juvenile pranks—aimed at male readers finding humor in gender relations and propriety shifts.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
53 Captain Billy's Whiz Bang We Expect a Free Can For This! I saw a girl the other day who was so bashful she asked for a lady clerk when she wanted to buy some Arbuckle's coffee. * * * The Happy Ham All smokers are inveterate; Their vice becomes inured, Only a ham can smoke and smoke, And smoking still be cured. * * * I kicked a mongrel cur, He uttered a mournful wail. Where did I kick him, Sir? Ah! Thereby hangs a tail. * * * The most disgusting sight in the world is to see another fellow in an automobile with your best girl. * * * The old inhabitant says, "I kin remember when a young lady passed you, you always could hear the rustle of stiffly starched skirts." * * * Naughty Egg I wish I was a crow's egg As bad as bad can be, All cuddled up in a little nest Way up in a big tree. And when a grinning little boy Looked up at me in glee, I'd bust my naughty little self And sprinkle him with me.