Captain Billy's Whiz Bang, December 1924 · page 14 of 71
Captain Billy's Whiz Bang #67 — page 14: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page from the satirical magazine contains four separate humorous anecdotes mocking various subjects: 1. **Lieutenant-Governor Collins**: Ridicules a Minnesota politician's poor golf swing at a course opening—he hits six inches behind the ball while formally "declaring" the links open, suggesting incompetence masked by ceremony. 2. **Prohibition enforcement**: Satirizes Prohibition-era corruption. A federal prohibition agent sent Monday to investigate a bar doesn't return until Saturday, implying he spent the week at that very bar instead of shutting it down. 3. **Married men's club**: A joke about unhappy marriages. A club for "unhappily married men" near Paris has poor attendance—one member missed the first meeting by getting the date wrong, suggesting even miserable husbands prefer avoiding such gatherings. 4. **Gus's hat**: A brief joke about a worn-out hat being "exchanged" (lost) at a restaurant, humorously reframing carelessness as practicality. The page reflects 1920s American humor: political corruption, Prohibition-era hypocrisy, marital discord, and everyday absurdities.
📄 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] MY WIFE tells a good story on Lieutenant-Governor Louis L. Collins, of Minneapolis, who officiated at the inaugura-tion of my new golf course at Breezy Point Lodge. According to the way my wife tells it, he selected a huge niblick with which to drive from the tee. Taking a mighty sweep at the ball he buried the head of the club deep into the earth about six inches behind the ball. Then in solemn tones, he uttered these prophetic words: “I declare these links duly opened.” * * * We know a bozo in Minneapolis who got a job with the prohibition forces. One Monday morning he was sent to see if a certain corner bar was doing business. He came back the following Saturday night and said it was. * * * THERE’S a movement on foot to start a married man’s club in Robbinsdale this winter. I hope it won’t be like the “Hen-Peck’s Club” I heard about while in Paris. This club was organized by a man from a village near Valenciennes who had hit upon the idea of a union of all unhappily married men of any age. One married man in the village was absent at the first meeting. He had made a mistake in the date. * * * Gus says his favorite hat, which he has worn for five years, will be good for another three or four years. He has had it cleaned twice and last month he exchanged it in a restaurant. [12]