Captain Billy's Whiz Bang, May 1922 · page 63 of 68
Captain Billy's Whiz Bang #33 — page 63: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This is a humor column featuring short jokes submitted by readers under pseudonymous names. It's not a political cartoon but rather a satirical advice column typical of 1920s American magazines. The jokes target recognizable social types: overweight people ("Fatty Felix"), cynical men, gold-diggers who marry for security then divorce for alimony ("Naughty Nellie"), and the absurdly naive. The humor is crude and direct—a pun confusing pneumonia/ammonia, fat-shaming, marital cynicism, and fabricated "Indian words" used as punchlines. The column reflects period attitudes: casual misogyny regarding women's financial motivations in marriage, dismissal of Native Americans (via the fake "Ohwhatanassiam"), and working-class masculine banter. These were mainstream "funny" to contemporary readers but reveal attitudes most modern readers would find offensive.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
Captain Billy's Whiz Bang 61 Our Rural Mail Box Gus Stevie—The difference between pneumonia and ammonia is that ammonia comes in bottles and pneumonia comes in chests. * * * Fatty Felix—Reduce, old boy, reduce. According to a modern Greek maxim, “A fat belly did not invent gunpowder.” * * * James J.—The more you stick up for the other fellow’s rights the less it will be necessary for you to stick up for your own. * * * Naughty Nellie—Considering his rare old age, Nell, I would refer you to the woman who believes in marrying for a home; divorcing for alimony; and outliving for insurance. * * * Pvt. I. O. Diform—Would suggest that you write the Arm Inspection Department of the Army in answer to your query. Never heard of a G. O. 45 Model shot gun. * * * May Turity—Ohwhatanassiam is an old Indian word meaning “End of All.”