Captain Billy's Whiz Bang, March 1924 · page 4 of 71
Captain Billy's Whiz Bang #57 — page 4: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains brief, humorous observations rather than illustrated cartoons. The "Sodbusters" heading likely refers to rural/unsophisticated people, fitting the satirical tone. The jokes mock early 1900s social conventions: mothers controlling daughters' marriages, physical attraction in women, gender stereotypes about spending money, and rural naiveté. References to "Teddy" (Theodore Roosevelt) and "Rough Riders" anchor this to Roosevelt's presidency era. The spaghetti and "wimmen" jokes employ wordplay typical of period humor. The final quip mocks rural "hicks" seeking loose women in libraries—suggesting both rural ignorance and anxieties about city morality. Overall, these are snippets of period comedy poking fun at courtship, class differences, and social pretension common to early 20th-century American magazines.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
SODBUSTERS ¶When a man marries a good girl, he merely marries the daughter of a very careful mama. ¶The Rough Riders elected Teddy president and some day they may do the same for Henry. ¶On icy days you can pick up a girl anywhere on the streets. ¶The curves of another man’s wife may delight a husband, but he wants his own wife square. ¶Many a man who is a free spender gets close with a pretty girl. ¶The man who invented spaghetti must have gotten the idea cut of his own noodle. ¶Our idea of a Hick is a person going to the city and hunting for wild “wimmen” in the public library.