Captain Billy's Whiz Bang, May 1922 · page 6 of 68
Captain Billy's Whiz Bang #33 — page 6: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This is a reader's letter praising Captain Billy's satirical magazine. The writer jokes about receiving the "Winter Annual" and thanks the editor for "Bull and Bullets" — likely humorous content. The letter is a **satire on Prohibition**. The writer repeatedly references alcohol ("Memory Eraser," "liquid gargle," "snootful") while nominally praising the magazine. He mocks Prohibition reformers as hypocritical — they claim New York is "dry" while ignoring that working-class districts like "Hell's Kitchen" still drink openly. The writer suggests reformers wouldn't dare advocate temperance alternatives (like "nut sundae") in rough neighborhoods, fearing violence. The humor relies on the writer's intoxicated voice — he admits "the stuff has begun to work, 'cause I'm skipping words" — making his drunken rambling the joke itself. This reflects *Whiz Bang's* irreverent stance toward Prohibition enforcement during the 1920s-30s era.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
4 Captain Billy's Whiz Bang Dear Captain Bill—Just received your “Winter An- nual.” After some watchful waiting the critter arrived safe this morning. I was just beginning to think I wasn’t going to get the pesky bull, when the big feller bounded through the doorway and bounced me on the bean. I want to speak right out loud and say he’s grown to be a pretty big boy since I saw him first. I wish to thank you very liquidly for the refreshing refreshments of your “Bull and Bullets,” Bill. I’m just after imbibing in a large and juicy snootful of “Memory Eraser” and I’ll say the snootfuls I take will make a guy do a lot of funny things he wouldn’t do if he was sober. But how can you help it these dark and gloomy days? Show me and I’ll tell you where I get it. The way I feel this day of our Lord I just know if I imbibe much more of this liquid gargle that is within my unsteady reach I’m just a going to be laying on my back purring with con- tentment or kicking blue elephants and pink mosquitoes off the foot of my bed. I don’t know how it is out your way, but since this old burg of ours went dry, it’s tough to keep sober if you’ve got the price, and yet those narrow-contracted, near-sighted, weak-minded reptiles who call themselves reformers belch forth in loud cadenzos that New York is dry. Down in the district where I work is known to the world as “Hell’s Kitchen.” You never hear tell of any of these paid reformers coming down here to tell the gang that a “nut sundae” can take the place of a pint of beer after a hard day’s work. Oh, no, not them birds, they’re too wise for that; they’re hip to the fact that the minute they opened their beaks in this district they’d be treated rough. Rave on, you say. I can’t, the stuff has begun to work, ’cause I’m skipping words like everything. I really believe your bull has started more poets, who worked at their trade as boilermakers once, to writing poems than anything I can think of at the present time. For instance, I’ve got a guy working for me who was a