Captain Billy's Whiz Bang, April 1922 · page 54 of 67
Captain Billy's Whiz Bang #32 — page 54: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page collects brief jokes typical of 1920s American humor magazines. Most rely on double entendres or wordplay: **"Purple Cow's Best One"**: A flirtation joke where Cleo's deadpan response ("keep it up") pretends to misunderstand Patricia's moral concern. **"Liza" joke**: Uses racial dialect stereotyping (common in era publications) for a crude joke about massage cream versus shoe polish. **"Flamingo"**: A college humor submission playing on the euphemism that the cat is sterile. **Restaurant/horse meat joke**: A slapstick bit where a teamster's command "Whoa" (to stop a horse) causes the diner's meat to stick in his throat—implying the restaurant serves horse meat. **Froth/Pennsylvania fraternity**: References Prohibition-era humor; "revenue officers" (federal agents enforcing alcohol laws) attending a banquet is ironic. **Manicure Story header**: Opens with a Shakespeare quote, likely setting up a joke that follows (not fully visible here). The page exemplifies lowbrow, pun-heavy humor targeting college readers and working-class audiences.
📄 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 Purple Cow’s Best One Cleo—“When Bill danced with me last night he kept letting his hand slip down my back.” Patricia—“I hope you rebuked him.” Cleo—“I did; I told him to keep it up.” * * * “Liza, what fo’ yo’ buy dat odder box of shoe blackin’?” “Go on, nigga’, dat ain’t shoe blackin’; dat’s ma mas- sage cream.” * * * Flamingo (Dennison University.) There is a cat in our home, And it is wondrous fat; It don’t have any kittens ’cause It ain’t that kind of cat. * * * That sure is horse meat they serve in that restaurant. Why, how do you know? Well, I ordered a steak and just as I took a bite some teamster on the street hollered “Whoa” and that meat stuck right in my throat. * * * Was the dance a success? Yes, roughly speaking. * * * Froth reports a successful banquet at a University of Pennsylvania fraternity house. A couple of the alumni were revenue officers. * * * Manicure Story “There is a divinity that shapes our ends, rough-hew them as we may.”