Life, 1929-08-16 · page 17 of 36
Life — August 16, 1929 — page 17: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page satirizes American materialism and two-car ownership. The lead story mocks a poor man's desperate pitch to buy a nickel-and-dime bank product by claiming America now needs two cars per family—a then-radical consumerist argument. The humor lies in the absurdity: the protagonist suggests this as a solution to traffic and transportation problems. The cartoon series below, captioned "Lady Spectator: What a man!", depicts an athletic man performing increasingly impressive feats (jumping, running, vaulting). The satire appears to mock either the idealization of masculine athleticism or advertising's exaggerated claims about human capability—contrasting sharply with the bumbling poor man above, suggesting class-based commentary on who gets celebrated in American culture.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
Progress It was a miserable night. As I stood on a corner looking for a taxi, I felt a nudge at my elbow and turned to see a deplorable wreck of a man looking up into my face with an ex- pression of gin and pleading. “Mister,” he whined hoarsely, “I ain't had a bite tuh eat since yessday— could yuh gimme a dime?” “You don’t want something to eat,” snapped I, for I was out of sorts. He straightened his bent shoulders proudly. “All right,” he said, with the simple dignity of the poor, “I'll tell you the tru’, I'm filling a nickel-an’-dime bank for the first payment on my second car. You wanta remember that America is a two-car country now. Suppose the missus wants to come in town for a tour of the shops? Either I hafta leave the Cadillac for her or she has to experience the inconven- iences of subway travel. Or suppose Junior, home from collitch, longs to drive over hill an’ dale wit’ the girl of the hour—or perhaps the family car is temporarily out of commission; wit’ only one car, the average Ameri- can family is oftentimes embarrassed an’ handicapped—wit’ two cars in the garage, they can meet every transpor tation emergency efficiently!” I gave the poor wretch fifty cents in nickels and took the subway home. —Heman Fay, Jr. “Young woman, why do you appear upon the Central Park bri- dle path mounted on a bicycle?” “Because the artist who made this picture can't draw a horse.” Lapy Spectator: What a man! comicbooks.com