Life, 1929-02-01 · page 28 of 40
Life — February 1, 1929 — page 28: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page satirizes early-20th-century upper-class anxiety about employment and entitlement. The main piece mocks a wealthy bank director who writes to his daughter explaining why her husband—despite wanting a position that lets him "express his personality"—cannot be hired. The satire is sharp: the director admits the bank has desks reserved exclusively for sons-in-law of other directors, yet claims *no suitable position exists* for the son-in-law because meaningful work would "dull the fineness of his nature." The joke exposes nepotism masquerading as principle—the father sends money instead of a job, enabling idleness while congratulating himself on protecting the young man from labor. The secondary cartoons and jokes below continue this theme of absurdity: a woman's expensive fur wrap ("bought," not stolen), a failed humorist, workplace banter about falling workers. Together, they ridicule privilege, nepotism, and the fiction that avoiding work preserves one's dignity.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
The Letters of a Modern Father My Dear Davcuter: I have your note about your husband being dissatisfied with his present position and wanting to get into something that will enable him to express his personality, [ am relieved to note that he had not yer resigned, for it will be rather hard for him to find a place that will do justice to | his personality. You inquire about the First, Second, and Third National Bank here, of which [ am a director. The trouble there is that the bank has only twenty-two clean desks with green pen sets for assistant cashiers | with personality; and at present they are all occupied by young men who married daughters of other directors. We are con- sidering remodeling the banking room to make space for six more assistant cashiers and five business getters, but I understand |those places were to take care of mar tiages now on schedule. It is not that I do not appreciate Wil- frid’s personality; I just do not know of anything here worthy of him. I could not, of course, risk ruining his life by letting him take any position where he would have to work and thus dull the fineness of his nature. I enclose the check which you did not ask for in so many words, Your Arrectionate Fatuer. McCready Huston. Maynette: Tom gave me a gorgeous fur wrap for my birthday. Grorta: Stole? Maysette: Why, certainly not, you cat! He bought it! Dip you hear about the professional humorist who tried to make a_ public speech, and got stage fright? Yes, he stood up, and then just gagged and choked. Her'’n: Don't you care for drama? His’n: Aw, the old lady’s all right, so long as she minds her own business! Boss (on twenty-third story girder): Migosh, izzat you, Mike? I thought 1 seen you tumblin’ down past me a secon = ago! The roof of Perkin's house leaked so badly this winter that the resultant effect enabled | Mixe: Musta been a coupla other fall- him to open it to the public profitably as a sort of Mammoth Cave. | ers, comicbooks.com