One of the challenges of writing these posts is giving proper due to the many writers and artists who helped shape the New Yorker universe, and especially to those we’ve almost forgotten.
April 30, 1932 cover by Theodore Haupt.
One writer who deserves our special attention is John Mosher, film critic for the New Yorker from 1928 to 1942 and a pioneer of the New Yorker short story. In her 2000 book Defining New Yorker Humor, Judith Yaross Lee notes how the “burlesque” prose of the early magazine was displaced by Mosher’s quieter humor, which lent support to Dorothy Parker’s ironic mode and E.B. White’s “travails of the Sufferer.” Mosher’s prose, writes Lee, “helped New Yorker humor combine broad comic conception and ironic realistic narration.”
In addition to regular film reviews and occasional profiles, Mosher penned nearly fifty short stories, or “casuals” as they were called. It was also Mosher who “discovered” writer John O’Hara when in 1929 he found one of O’Hara’s pieces in a “slush pile” of unsolicited submissions.
Without further ado, here is one of Mosher’s shorts, “Wake Up, You’re Forty” (Mosher turned forty in 1932) from the April 30 issue. It demonstrates Mosher’s ironic narrative style, skillfully deployed to describe a comically minor event:
THE STORYTELLER…John Mosher’sNew Yorker short stories (1925 to 1940) were collected in Celibate at Twilight, illustrated by New Yorker cartoonist Mary Petty. It included tales about life on Fire Island, where Mosher and his partner, broker Philip Claflin, became the first gay property owners in the vacation village of Cherry Grove. Visitors included Mosher’s close friend Edith Lewis as well as Willa Cather, Janet Flanner, Wolcott Gibbs, and James Thurber. (neglectedbooks.com/findagrave.com)Aerial view of Cherry Grove, circa 1960. (pineshistory.org)
On Sept. 3, 1942, Mosher died of heart failure in New York City at the young age of 50. He was remembered by his New Yorker colleagues in this eulogy found on page 72 of the Sept. 12, 1942 issue:
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Going Up!
The “Talk of the Town” took a look at the innovative double-decker elevators being installed in the new Cities Service Building (now 70 Pine Street) in Lower Manhattan. Although the Cities Service building didn’t have the fame of the Empire State Building or the Chrysler Building, when completed the 952-foot Cities Service Building stood as the third tallest in the world.
STILL STANDING TALL…The Cities Service Building (now 70 Pine Street) in Lower Manhattan after its completion in 1932; center, a miniature model of the building, incorporated between the eastern entrance portals on Pine and Cedar Streets; at right, a clipping from the January 1932 Popular Science magazine detailing the unique double-decker elevator design. (MCNY/Wikipedia/Popular Science)
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Electric Patriotism
E.B. White kicked off his “Notes and Comment” with some observations about the newly-renovated Union Square and its electrified American flag:
PATRIOT GAMES…Then as now, Americans have always disagreed on what constitutes a tasteful patriotic display. At top, Union Square (circa 1930) arranged around Henry Kirke Brown’s 1856 statue, George Washington; in 2011 a U.S. Armed Forces Recruiting Office (below) at Broadway and Seventh Avenue, was fitted with a giant electric flag of red, white and blue LED lights. (Dick Ebert)
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From Our Advertisers
Lord & Taylor rolled out some new ads illustrated by Melisse, aka Mildred Oppenheim…
…apparently giddy about their new campaign, Lord & Taylor ran a second one-column ad in the back pages…
…apparently Melisse was a big draw in the 1930s, based on this Dec. 12, 1931 advertisement in the New York Sun (photo added by me, via strippersguide.blogspot.com)…
…travel companies continued their appeals to the well-heeled and included exotic destinations such as Zoppot…
…which today is known as Sopot, Poland…its Sofitel Grand Hotel (aka the Kasino Hotel) continues to serve as a spa resort…
TAKING THE WATERS…Sopot’s Grand Hotel (aka the Kasino Hotel) continues to serve as a spa resort — it is seen in the background of this 1950 photo (top); below, hotel interior in 1927. The hotel has hosted the famous — Greta Garbo, Marlene Dietrich, Josephine Baker — and the infamous, including Adolph Hitler. More recent guests to the hotel included Prince, Shakira, Vladimir Putin and The Weeknd. (Wikipedia/sofitelgrandsopot.com)
…we move back to the States, where car companies continued to vie for scarce consumer dollars…Buick hired an artist to create this generic image of a successful-looking businessman, hoping to convince readers to invest in their automobile…
…the makers of LaSalle, a downscale version of Cadillac, wanted readers to imagine that owning their car would put them in the same company as the fashionably blasé patrician class…
…Hudson also made an appeal to class with this full-color ad designed to pique the Anglophilic tendencies of many readers…
…the makers of the luxurious Packard usually marketed to older monied folks who sought mechanical quality, refinement and reliability, so this ad was a bit of a surprise…
…and speaking of youth, with have an ad from Ciné-Kodak that begins on a lively note…
…but then includes this guilt-inducing bummer…
…Otto Soglow kept things lighter with his latest ad for Sanka…
…which brings us to the cartoons, and Soglow’s Little King…
…Robert Day gave us a cordial shoppe owner spying opportunity…
…James Thurber explored the spirit realm…
…Peter Arno found misunderstanding at the manor house…
…and Kemp Starrett found a real fixer-upper…
…William Steig let one of his “Small Fry” speak his mind…
…and we close with Alan Dunn, and the pressures of modern love…
Joan Crawford was an MGM star by the 1930s, and according to many critics, an absolute scene-stealer in 1932’s Grand Hotel. However, the New Yorker’s film critic John Mosher saw Garbo, and only Garbo, in this Academy Award-winning pre-code drama.
April 23, 1932 cover by E.B. White. Although White’s friend and early office mate James Thurber had been contributing drawings for more than a year, it was White who would land the first cover — his only one (Thurber’s first cover would come in 1936). Maria Popova (brainpickings.org) shares this excerpt from a 1969 Paris Review interview, during which White explained to George Plimpton: “I’m not an artist and never did any drawings for The New Yorker. I did turn in a cover and it was published. I can’t draw or paint, but I was sick in bed with tonsillitis or something, and I had nothing to occupy me, but I had a cover idea — of a sea horse wearing a nose bag. I borrowed my son’s watercolor set, copied a sea horse from a picture in Webster’s dictionary, and managed to produce a cover that was bought. It wasn’t much of a thing. I even loused up the whole business finally by printing the word ‘oats’ on the nose bag, lest somebody fail to get the point.”
Greta Garbo’s previous films hadn’t exactly wowed Mosher, but the gossip he was hearing even before he screened Grand Hotel suggested it was not to be missed. Mosher touted the unseen film (in the April 16 issue), expressing his hope that the rumors would prove true — he feared Garbo would quit the business altogether and leave the country if she didn’t land a hit. His fears were laid to rest:
Adapted from the 1929 German novel Menschen im Hotel by Vicki Baum, Grand Hotel is considered the first all-star epic. The brainchild of MGM’s production head Irving Thalberg, the film proved a triumph for director Edmund Goulding, who somehow managed to direct five leading roles into one film classic.
GRAND OPENING…The April 12, 1932 opening of Grand Hotel at Broadway’s famed Astor Theatre was much anticipated by critic John Mosher and pretty much everyone else. (ny.curbed.com)STELLAR CAST…Set at a luxurious Berlin hotel, Grand Hotel brought together the stories of five seemingly unrelated lives. Clockwise, from top left, crooked industrialist Preysing (Wallace Beery), trades innuendos with an ambitious stenographer, Flaemmchen (Joan Crawford); Baron Felix von Gaigern (John Barrymore), a once wealthy man fallen on hard times, supports himself by stealing from vulnerable marks like the depressed ballerina Grusinskaya (Greta Garbo), and also teams up with a gravely ill accountant (Lionel Barrymore, John’s real brother, not pictured here); hotel entrance from the film; MGM movie poster deftly juggled the film’s five big stars; advertisement from the April 16, 1932 New Yorker made much of the film’s star power. (Wikipedia/IMDB)THE OTHER BIG STAR in Grand Hotel was the luxurious Art Deco set created by Cedric Gibbons. Centered on the hotel’s reception desk, the set allowed filming in 360 degrees. (IMDB)
And let’s not forget that it was in this film Garbo famously uttered “I want to be alone” — it ranks number 30 in AFI’s 100 Years…100 Movie Quotes. In 2007 Grand Hotel was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress.
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She’s Back
Lois Long aka “Lipstick” turned in yet another “Tables for Two,” even though she had abandoned that column as a regular feature two years earlier. Unlike those earlier columns, Long seemed to have had her fill of the night life, but occasionally she found a diversion or two worth mentioning. She also offered her thoughts about the decline of civilization, indicated by such behaviors as dining at the early hour of 7 p.m. — “rawboned” she called it…
NIGHT LIGHTS…Singer Kate Smith and comedic performer Beatrice Lillie managed to keep Lois Long awake in the wee hours of nightclub entertainments. (katesmith.org/The Poster Corp)
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Notes, and More Notes
Despite his cover contribution, and his continued presence in the “Notes and Comment” section, the year 1932 is regarded as one of E.B. White’s leanest as a full-time writer for the New Yorker. According to Scott Elledge in E.B. White: A Biography, White published only a few “Talk” pieces or signed contributions. With a toddler about the house (Joel White had just turned 1 the previous December), White and wife Katharine enjoyed what Elledge describes as perhaps “the happiest of their years together, “able to enjoy fully their professional and private lives in the city they both loved.” So perhaps that explains this particular “Notes” entry for the April 23 issue. Still, it’s good stuff:
(Note Otto Soglow’s Tammany-themed spot cartoon — the political machine was still chugging along, but its days were numbered)
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From Our Advertisers
We begin with this colorful ad from McCutcheon’s to brighten our day…
…the Franklin Automobile Company responded to competition from other luxury car makers by introducing its own 12-cylinder model, the only American car to be powered by a 12-cylinder air-cooled engine (according to the H.H. Franklin Club)…
…introducing a 12-cylinder luxury car was not a good move in 1932 — one of the worst years of the Depression — and the company folded by 1934…but what a swell-looking car…
(Courtesy H.H. Franklin Club)
…one innovation that would stick around, however, was the lighted refrigerator, something to brighten those dim days of 1932, that is if you could even afford an electric fridge…
…named to evoke the luxury automobile, the British-made Rolls Razor made its debut in the back pages of the New Yorker with this panel cartoon ad featuring a hapless suitor and his girlfriend’s nosy kid brother…
…the razor came in a rigid case enclosed by two detachable lids; one carried a sharpening stone and the other a leather strop. When a lid was removed, the razor’s oscillating a handle drove a shaft along the frame, pushing the solid, hollow ground blade forward against the stone or dragging it against the strop…
…and here’s an ad you don’t see often in the New Yorker…one featuring children…
…on to our cartoonists, we have more kids via William Steig’s Small Fry…
…James Thurber continued to ply his cartooning craft with one of his favorite subjects:
…here is a more detailed look at the above…
…John Held Jr. continued to take us back to those saucy days of yore…
…Gardner Rea sketched this hereditary pratfall…
…E. McNerney gave us a woman whose beau was in alliance with architecture critic Lewis Mumford…
…Alan Dunn looked in on the fast-paced world of business…
There was a time when dirigibles were considered the future of transatlantic transportation. In the 1930s they could carry more passengers than any other type of aircraft while offering amenities usually associated with ocean liners such as private cabins, dining rooms and large observation decks. They were also faster than those water-borne vessels.
March 26, 1932 cover by Bela Dankovsky.
Dirigibles, however, were challenging to operate — with crew members outnumbering passengers — and sometimes they fell from the sky. Such was the fate of the USS Shenandoah during a 1925 publicity flight over Ohio. On board was the Navy’s Lt. Cmdr. Charles Emery Rosendahl (1892 – 1977), who had to act quickly when the airship encountered a severe thunderstorm. Hitting a violent updraft that carried it beyond the pressure limits of its gas bags, the airship was torn apart. For the March 26 “Profile,” writer Henry Pringle recounted Rosendahl’s experience:
HE LIVED TO TELL ABOUT IT…Clockwise, from top left, Lt. Cmdr. Charles Rosendahl, USN, circa 1930; the USS Shenandoah in pieces near Caldwell, Ohio; the airship in better days; close-up view of the wreckage. (Wikipedia/airships.net)IT WAS A GAS…Like other other early dirigibles, the USS Shenandoah was designed for war (fleet reconnaissance) rather than passenger service. It was the first rigid airship to use a safer gas, helium, rather than hydrogen to gain lift. However, helium was scarce at the time, and the Shenandoah used almost all of the world’s reserves to fill its gas cells, which held 2,100,000 cubic feet. (fly.historicwings.com)
ON THE CATWALK…Lt. Cmdr. Charles Rosendahl hurried through this area while the USS Shenandoah was being torn apart in mid-air. Rosendahl was ordered out of the control car by the airship’s pilot, Cmdr. Zachery Landsdowne, to check on the Shenandoah’s oil and gas tanks. It was an order that ultimately saved Rosendahl’s life: Eight crew members in the control car, including Landsdowne, perished. In all, 14 crew members lost their lives. (airships.net)
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Untouchable Unmentionables
In his “Notes and Comment,” E.B. White mused about one Boston store’s promotion of a line of women’s underwear as “Gandhi panties,” apparently inspired by the loincloth worn by Indian liberator Mahatma Gandhi:
THE SIMPLE LIFE…Mahatma Gandhi held numerous hunger strikes during his years of protest against India’s caste system and British Imperial rule. He is pictured here in jail in September 1932 during the second of his fasts, protesting the British government’s decision to separate India’s electoral system by caste. (history.com)
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Hearst Wurst
Film critic John Mosher was not happy with the happy ending (or much else) in the William Randolph Hearst-backed Polly of the Circus, which starred Hearst’s mistress, Marion Davies, along with emerging star Clark Gable, who portrayed a small-town minister who risked his career for love with a trapeze artist.
JUST READ THE NAUGHTY BITS…Top image: With the backing of William Randolph Hearst, Marion Davies was able to bill her latest MGM film as a “Marion Davies Production.” Davies had star billing over Clark Gable in Polly of the Circus, but as his star rose in the 1930s, Davies saw her fortunes (and Hearst’s) drain away during the Depression years. Bottom image: the Reverend John Hartley (Gable) and trapeze artist Polly Fisher (Davies) “look for something hot” in the Book of Ruth. (IMDB)
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From Our Advertisers
Electric refrigerators for home use had been around for less than decade in 1932, but as more companies got into the business, the drive to distinguish one’s product from the competitor’s became keen…the distinctive “Monitor Top” GE refrigerators were touted by Rex Cole in both their ads and in the design of their showrooms…
…Allen-Ingraham, on the other hand, demonstrated how their “dual-automatic” Westinghouse could bring harmony to a party of bootleg-swilling old gents…
…the makers of Electrolux invoked the inevitable march of time and progress in promoting their “automatic” refrigerator…
…on to sundry things, the upscale British department store Fortnum & Mason employed this simple ad to demonstrate the superiority of old money over the preening lower orders…
…and in the back pages we find these cheap ads for corsets, a prep school and a shorthand lessons…
…the makers of Listerine reminded readers of the connection between their old line of antiseptic products and their new line of cigarettes…
…the Santa Fe Railroad invited travelers to the Summer Olympics in Los Angeles…
…while the Missouri Pacific line promoted the wonders of Kansas City, the “Heart of America”…
…makers of the autogiro — part airplane, part helicopter — continued to promote the advantages of this supposedly easy to fly contraption…in the 1930s the autogiro was seen as the future of personal air travel, some predicting that the craft would join the automobile in many a garage…
…on to our cartoons, Alice Harvey found one man who was ready for the autogiro lifestyle…
…and Peter Arno gave us an old walrus ready to take advantage of an unsuspecting host…
……and Helen Hokinson’s “girls” also found themselves involved in a scandalous situation…
…on to the April 2, 1932 issue…
April 2, 1932 cover by Julian de Miskey.
…where this time critic John Mosher took a look at a new film (and a new film genre) — Tarzan, the Ape Man, starring Johnny Weissmuller and Maureen O’Sullivan.
Weissmuller (1904-1984) was well known in the 1920s as a five-time Olympic Gold Champion swimmer, so the 28-year-old was a familiar face when he stepped into the title role. The Irish-born O’Sullivan (1911-1998) had appeared in seven films in 1930-31 before she was cast as Jane Parker in Tarzan, the Ape Man. Mosher found the film silly, but entertaining nonetheless.
THAT PRE-CODE LOOK…Before decency codes were strictly enforced in Hollywood, many early 1930s films featured scenes that were pretty racy for those times. Both Maureen O’Sullivan and Johnny Weissmuller were scantily clad for their roles in 1932’s Tarzan the Ape Man. (IMDB/fanpop.com/manapop.com/YouTube)
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Cancel Me, Kate
“That’s Why Darkies Were Born” was a popular song in those days of casual racism, written by Ray Henderson and Lew Brown for George White’s Scandals of 1931. It was recorded by a number artists including Paul Robeson (see below) and Kate Smith — it was one of Smith’s biggest records and also the reason she was recently “cancelled” in some sports venues.
In 2019 the New York Yankees announced that Smith’s rendition of “God Bless America” would no longer be played at Yankee Stadium, citing not only Smith’s version of “That’s Why Darkies Were Born” but also her past performances of the song “Pickaninny Heaven.” The Philadelphia Flyers followed the Yankees example, covering up and later removing a statue of Smith outside the Wells Fargo Center.
THAT’S WHY YOU WERE CANCELLED…One of Kate Smith’s biggest early hits was her performance of “That’s Why Darkies Were Born.” In 2019 the Philadelphia Flyers organization covered and later removed a statue of Smith outside the Wells Fargo Center. (mprnew.org)
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From Our Advertisers
We have more inducements to travel, this time abroad and in style aboard the French Line…
…or if you were looking for something a bit more exotic, Intourist could book you passage to the Soviet Union…
…on to our cartoonists, we begin with this great spot illustration by Victor De Pauw, who contributed to the New Yorker from 1928 to 1948…
…William Crawford Galbraith offered some insight into the cultural tastes of the upper orders…
…while Alan Dunn illustrated the Depression’s domestic woes…
…and we have what I believe is the first appearance of William Steig’s “Small Fry” children identified as such…many more would follow, later to be collected into a popular book by the same name…
…and another by Steig of a person contemplating his life’s desire…
…and we end with James Thurber, with all of his familiar themes tied up in one drawing…
The year 1932 was a tough one for many Americans, barely scraping by in the deepening Depression. But to the suffering millions in the Soviet Union, America’s economic woes looked like a walk in the park.
Jan. 30, 1932 cover by Rose Silver.
The year marked the beginning of a catastrophic famine that swept across the Soviet countryside, thanks to the government’s bone-headed and heartless forced collectivization that caused more than five million people to perish from hunger. Those events, however, were still on the horizon when Robin Kinkead, a New York Times Moscow correspondent, ventured out into Moscow’s frigid streets in search of a lightbulb. Here is his story:
WE HAVE PLENTY OF NOTHING FOR EVERYONE…In 1930s Moscow, and in the decades beyond, much of life consisted of standing in line for everything from bread to light bulbs.MAGIC LANTERN…Russian peasants experience electricity for the first time in their village. (flashback.com)STALIN CAST A LARGE SHADOW over his subjects, even when they sought a bit of light in the darkness. Stalin and Lenin profiles served as glowers in this Soviet lightbulb, circa 1935. The first series of these bulbs were presented to the delegates of Soviet parliament of 1935, just in case they forgot who was in charge — or who might liquidate them at any moment, for any reason, or for no reason. (englishrussia.com)
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One of Theirs
Miguel Covarrubias was one of the first artists to contribute to the fledgling New Yorker, and his linear style was well known to readers when he opened his latest show at New York’s Valentine Gallery. It featured works he had created during a 1931 sojourn in the East Indies. Critic Murdock Pemberton found the palette reminiscent of Covarrubias’ earlier work during the Harlem Renaissance:
GLOBETROTTER…A frequent contributor to the early New Yorker, Miguel Covarrubias traveled the world in search of inspiration. His 1932 exhibition at New York’s Valentine Gallery featured his latest work, a series of “Balinese paintings” including In Preparation of a Balinese Ceremony, at right. (sothebys.com)MAN OF MANY TALENTS…An early Covarrubias contribution to the New Yorker in the March 7, 1925 issue.
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From Our Advertisers
Listerine had been around since the late 1860s, but it wasn’t marketed as a mouthwash until 1914. The brand really took off in the 1920s when it was heavily advertised as a solution for “chronic halitosis” (bad breath), so in 1930 its makers went one step further by adding a few drops of their product to one of the chief causes of bad breath. The folks at Listerine were also keen to the growing market of women smokers — note the fifth paragraph: “They seem to appeal especially to women”…
…when you run out of ideas to amuse your grandchild, drop your top hat and walking stick and let him take you for a swing on a GE fridge door…wow, admire its “all-steel sturdiness” as it slowly tips toward the unsuspecting lad…
…on to our cartoons, Rea Irvin showed readers what he thought of the latest “rosy” economic predictions…
…but with the economy still deep in the dumps, building continued to boom, per Robert Day…
…Perry Barlow gave us a fellow needing a break from the daily gloom…
…Richard Decker unveiled this crime-fighting duo…
…Alan Dunn tempered the flames of passion…
…and we close this issue with one of James Thurber’s most famous cartoons…
…on to Feb. 6, 1932…
Feb. 6, 1932 cover by Constantin Alajalov.
…and we head straight to our advertisers……and yet with another sad Prohibition-era ad, this from the makers of Red & Gold Vintages, who promised to dress up your bootleg rotgut with many fine flavorings…
…New Yorker founding editor Harold Ross couldn’t care less about the advertising department as long as it paid the bills and kept its nose out of editorial, but I wonder if a cig dropped from his puritanical (if profane) lips when he glanced at this ad…
…as noted in the Listerine ad above, tobacco companies were eager to tap the growing market of women smokers…actress Sue Carol egged on the sisterhood in this ad…Carol would have a brief acting career (including 1929’s Girls Gone Wild — not quite as racy as the 1990s DVD series) before becoming a successful talent agent…
…as noted in my previous “Dream Cars” post, women were also a fast growing market for automobiles, and manufacturers — desperate for Depression-era sales — scrambled to show women all of the swell gadgets that would make driving a snap (as if men didn’t need these gadgets too)…
…and here we have an ad from Kodak that demonstrated the ease of its home movie camera, which could go anywhere, say, like the horse races in Havana…
…Havana then was a playground for wealthier Americans, and many resided at a grand hotel operated by another rich American…
…but if you remained in town, you should at least know how to get tickets to the latest show (this drawing is signed “Russell”…could it be the noted illustrator Russell Patterson?)…
…on to our cartoons, Rea Irvin again commented on the latest predictions for economic recovery…
…but Alan Dunn found one woman who wanted an adventure, not a job…
…perhaps she should hang out with one of Barbara Shermund’s “New Women,” who had a flair for the dramatic…
…as for those seeking a new life, Mary Petty considered the costs…
…Richard Decker took us to the high seas, where a thirsty yachtsman hailed a passing smuggler…
…Otto Soglow probed the sorrows of youth…
…and William Crawford Galbraith, the joys…
…and James Thurber introduced his classic dog in a big way on this two-page spread…
…and on to one more issue, Feb. 13, 1932…
Feb. 13, 1932 cover by S. Liam Dunne.
…we begin with a nerd alert — the Feb. 13 cover represented one of the magazine’s biggest departures from the original Rea Irvin nameplate, here heavily embellished within S. Liam Dunne’s design. Departures in previous issues were more subtle, Irvin himself experimented with an elongated version in the third issue (below, left). For the April 17, 1926 issue, Katharine and Clayton Knight’s* stylish illustration (center) was the first to overlap part of the nameplate, and Sue Williams’ Nov. 17, 1928 cover (right) was the first to embellish the Irvin font.
*A note on Katharine Sturges Knight and Clayton Knight. The April 17, 1926 cover (center) was the only design by the Knights published by the New Yorker. The original picture was drawn on wood by Katharine and then cut by Clayton. Their son, Hilary Knight, is also an artist, best known as the illustrator of Kay Thompson’sEloise book series.
…on to the advertisements, kicking off with this subtle appeal from the makers of the unfortunately named “Spud” menthol cigarettes…here a young woman experiences Spud’s “mouth-happiness” while attending the annual Beaux Arts Ball at the new Waldorf-Astoria…
…if you’re wondering why the Spud ad featured a guy in a powdered wig puffing on a cigarette, well the theme of the 1932 ball was “A Pageant of Old New York.” Every year had a different costume theme, and the ladies and gentlemen of the ruling classes delighted in dressing up for the occasion…
PLAYING DRESS-UP…Program for the 1932 Beaux Arts Ball, and two of the attendees, Frank Sanders and Frances Royce. (Pinterest)
…if stuffy events weren’t your thing, you could chuck the fancy duds and head to the sunny beaches of Bermuda…
…I include this Coty advertisement for its modern look — it easily could have appeared in a magazine from the 50s or even 60s…the artwork is by American fashion illustrator Ruth Sigrid Grafstrom…
…the auto show has left town, but for some reason the makers of 12-cylinder models continued to shill their products in the New Yorker…Auburn (the middle ad) built beautiful, upscale vehicles, but the Depression would drop it to its knees by 1937…Pierce Arrow would succumb the following year…Lincoln, the highest-priced of these three, would hang on thanks to the largess of parent Ford…
…New Yorker cartoonist John Held Jr. picked up some extra bucks by designing this ad for Chase and Sanborn’s…
…and on to our other cartoonists/illustrators, Reginald Marsh wrapped this busy dance hall scene around a section of “The Talk of the Town”…
…Otto Soglow was back with his Little King, and the challenges of fatherhood…
…Leonard Dove gave us a knight lost on his crusade…
…Richard Decker explored the softer side of gangster life…
…and we sign off with Peter Arno, and a little misunderstanding…
In 1931 Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney (image above) opened a new art museum in Greenwich Village that would be unlike any other in Manhattan, one that would focus exclusively on American art and artists.
Nov. 28, 1931 cover by Harry Brown.
Ninety years ago American painters and sculptors were mostly considered second-rate by critics who had cut their teeth on the Old World’s “Great Masters.” An exception was the New Yorker’s first art critic, Murdock Pemberton, who accused such institutions as the Metropolitan Museum of discouraging American art. It is a bit surprising, however, that Pemberton initially gave a cool reception to the opening of the Whitney Museum of American Art, perceiving that its founders were putting the cart before the horse:
AMERICAN ORIGINAL…The original Whitney Museum of American Art was located at 8 – 12 West Eighth Street in Greenwich Village. Above, images from a 1937 museum catalog, and (bottom right) a view of the building’s West Eighth Street facade, circa 1940-50. (Whitney Museum/Life magazine)SHE WORE THE PANTS…Robert Henri’s 1916 portrait of Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, sculptor and founder of the Whitney Museum. Gertrude’s husband, Harry Payne Whitney, would not allow his wife to hang the portrait in their Fifth Avenue town house because he didn’t want visitors to see his wife “in pants.” Instead, the portrait hung in Gertrude’s West 8th Street studio, which became the first Whitney Museum in 1931. (whitney.org)
Despite Pemberton’s initial concerns, the Whitney became a beloved New York institution, moving in 1954 from the West Eighth location to a larger space on West 54th, and then to its iconic Marcel Breuer-designed building at Madison and 75th, which opened in 1966. The museum would move again in 2015 to its current location at 99 Gansevoort Street in a building designed by Renzo Piano.
IMPERMANENT COLLECTION…The Whitney would move three times after its 1931 opening, first to West 54th in 1954, then to its iconic Marcel Breuer-designed home at Madison and 75th (opened in 1966), and finally to its current location at 99 Gansevoort Street. (museuminforme.blogspot.com)
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Party Pooper
William Faulkner attracted much attention among literary circles during his extended visit to New York in 1931, however (as reported in “The Talk of the Town”) the author was able to dodge most of it by staying put in his Tudor City apartment.
HOME ALONE…William Faulkner spent most of his time in New York holed up in his Tudor City apartment, where he worked on the manuscript for Light in August. (LA Times/Wikipedia)
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This or That
While we are on the subject of literary giants, here is a poem submitted by E.B. White to the Nov. 28 issue that explored some universal half-truths:
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From Our Advertisers
As the market for cigarettes continued to increase, so did the number of new brands launched to take advantage of all those eager young puffers. The makers of Condossis Cigarettes hoped to create some buzz for their new product through a series of ads written by Mark O’Dea and illustrated by the New Yorker’sGardner Rea. Apparently the makers of Condossis believed that a posh backstory would lend a certain élan to their smokes. This seems all for naught — I haven’t found a record of the brand beyond 1938…
…a few of those posh smokers might have considered heading to Monte Carlo for the holidays, where they could also legally drink and gamble and forget about the jobless masses back home…
…but you needn’t go to Monte Carlo to signal your taste for the finer things, at least that is what B. Altman claimed with their lower-priced French knock-offs (although $95 was still a lot of dough in 1931)…
…Bonwit Teller also boasted of its low-priced evening wraps, so affordable that one could consider having a different wrap to complement every gown in one’s wardrobe ($135 in 1931 is roughly equivalent to $2,300 today)…
…the makers of Lenthéric perfumes offered the potential for shame and embarrassment if one didn’t choose their product for that special holiday gift…
…but perhaps the happiest shopper of all could shell out a mere $2.50 for the latest editions of the New Yorker Album (the 4th) or the New Yorker Scrapbook (drawings of a delighted couple courtesy Peter Arno)…
…on to our cartoons, we begin with Mary Petty and a tête-à-tête over tea…
…and Petty again with one woman’s attempt at noblesse oblige…
…Barbara Shermund looked in on the very idle rich…
…William Steig spotted a bald-watcher…
…E. McNerney revealed a secret among siblings…
…and William Crawford Galbraith gave us a backstage glimpse of a Broadway revue…
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On to the Dec. 5 issue…
Dec. 5, 1931 cover by Rea Irvin.
…which featured a profile of renowned violinist and composer Efrem Zimbalist (1889-1985). The son of a Russian conductor, Zimbalist was married to the famous American soprano Alma Gluck…
…and the entertainment gene continued on through the family line, as Zimbalist and Gluck’s son, Efrem Zimbalist Jr., would become a star in Hollywood, as would their granddaughter, Stephanie Zimbalist.
ALL IN THE FAMILY…Famed violinist Efrem Zimbalist and American soprano Alma Gluck (top, left) would pass on their entertainment genes to son Efrem Zimbalist Jr. (known for his starring roles in 77 Sunset Strip and The F.B.I.) and granddaughter Stephanie Zimbalist, who portrayed sleuth Laura Holt in the NBC series Remington Steele. Top right, a “Profile” caricature of Zimbalist by Al Frueh. (Wikipedia/Pinterest)
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From Our Advertisers
Much to the delight of the New Yorker advertising department, the makers of Condossis Cigarettes were back with their second installment of the adventures of the “Condossis Family”…
…on the other hand, the well-established Chesterfield brand didn’t have to try quite as hard — offering an attractive woman and some supporting copy that subtly suggested that a woman could credit her fine demeanor to a mere cigarette…
…on to our comics, we have this two-page entry by Rea Irvin…
…a bit of offensive driving, Helen Hokinson-style…
…Carl Rose gave us an unlikely candidate for a chaste role…
…Alan Dunn’s entry played to the stereotypes of his day…
…Frank McIntosh plied the Sugar Daddy waters to come up with this gem…
…Garrett Price gave us a gift designed to light a man’s fire…
…Barbara Shermund lit a flame of a different sort between a dowager and her latest escort…
…and we end with James Thurber, and one of my all-time favorites…
In an age of toe-tapping musicals and screwball comedies — which served to distract from the grim realities of the Great Depression — one playwright was content to continue mining the deep veins of tragedy and pessimism than ran through the 1930s.
Nov. 7, 1931 cover by Margaret Schloeman.
A Chekhovian realist, Eugene O’Neill (1888 – 1953) had yet to write his masterpiece, Long Day’s Journey into Night, but in 1931 he was already well established as America’s preeminent playwright. When his naturalistic Mourning Becomes Electra hit the Guild Theatre stage, New Yorker theatre critic Robert Benchley had little doubt about O’Neill’s greatness as a playwright, even if he wasn’t so sure about the play itself:
O’Neill’s tragic pose was borne from childhood, the son of an alcoholic father and a mother who became addicted to morphine after his difficult birth. His older brother, Jamie, would drink himself to death. It doesn’t end there. O’Neill’s own two sons would commit suicide, and he would disown his remaining daughter, Oona O’Neill, when at age 18 she married silent film star Charlie Chaplin, 36 years her senior. An odd footnote: Chaplin was best friends with Ralph Barton, a cartoonist for the early New Yorker who took his own life after Eugene O’Neill married Barton’s ex, Carlotta Monterey. To close the loop, O’Neill and Monterey had a mess of a marriage between his alcoholism and her addiction to sedatives. No wonder the man rarely smiled.
WRONG MEDS, MY DEAR…Christine Mannon (Alla Nazimova) recoils from her husband, Ezra (Lee Baker) after giving him a poison that he mistakes for his heart medicine. At right, Christine and her daughter, Lavinia (Alice Brady), await the return of Ezra from battle. All three actors were part of the original cast of Eugene O’Neill’sMourning Becomes Electra, which was a retelling of Oresteia by Aeschylus. (allanazimova.com)FAMILIAR FACE…Eugene O’Neill made his third appearance on the cover of Time magazine for the Nov. 2, 1931 issue. He made a total of four appearances on the magazine’s cover (1924, 1928, 1931 and 1946). At right, cover of Guild Theatre program. (Time/Pinterest)SAY CHEESE…Eugene O’Neill wore his familiar scowl in this undated portrait with his third (and final) wife, stage and film actress Carlotta Monterey. (famousfix.com)
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Go West, William
When Mae West announced she was going to present a modern version of William Shakespeare’s Macbeth and play the part of Lady Macbeth, Wolcott Gibbs went to work on possible scenarios for such a production. Here is one of them:
LADIES MACBETH?…Actually, only two of these women made the cut to play Lady Macbeth. Gladys Cooper (center) appeared as Lady Macbeth in a 1935 production at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre that lasted barely a month. The following year Edna Thomas (right) portrayed Lady Macbeth in a Federal Theatre Project production of Macbeth with an all-Black cast. Orson Welles adapted and directed the production, which was staged at Harlem’s Lafayette Theatre. It became a box office and critical sensation.
* * *
Those Hats Again
And now to E.B. White, who once again explored the mysteries of the Empress hat:
TAKE THIS, MR. LIPPMANN…Thelma Todd wearing an Empress Eugénie hat in the 1932 comedy Speak Easily. (Wikipedia)
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Rah, Rah, Sis Boom Bah
And so, in a city with one of the most storied teams in Major League Baseball, the New Yorker continued to ignore that sport as it gushed over college football, John Tunis even going the extra mile to check out homecoming at Ohio State.
HOMECOMING ROYALTY…THE Ohio State football team went 6-3 in 1931, but they blanked Navy 20-0 in their homecoming game. (elevenwarriors.com)
* * *
Boxing Brainiac
Several times before in this blog we have encountered boxing great Gene Tunney and his taste for the literary life. E.B. White gave us the latest on the Champ in “The Talk of the Town”…
THE FINER THINGS…Heavyweight Boxing Champion Gene Tunney, left, discusses things that don’t involve hitting people with writer George Bernard Shaw during a 1929 vacation to Brioni. (AP)
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From Our Advertisers
It’s the Depression, Prohibition is still in force (kind of), so what’s a body to do to blow off some steam? Well, you could take up smoking, every waking moment, at least when it came to this guy…
…and these were the days when tobacco companies offered competing claims about the health benefits of their cigarettes (weight loss, calmer nerves etc.). So the folks at Listerine, who were all about keeping you safe from nasty mouth germs, launched a cigarette of their own, which was “taking the country by storm,” at least in their estimation…
…and I throw this in to give you an idea of how far cigarette companies would go, and how folks would respond in the early 1930s…at left is a 1932 advertisement from the back cover of Popular Mechanics, telling us that “Everybody” is deeply inhaling their product…of course people became addicted, including this young woman (right) featured in a 1931 Popular Science news item who managed to smoke and read a book while reducing her figure…
…back to the New Yorker ads from the Nov. 7 issue, here is one that offered a “scientific” way to remove nicotine from cigarettes, allowing only “pure tobacco” to enter your pink lungs…
…and now a couple of lovely color ads for Houbigant cosmetics…
…and our friends at Alcoa, diligently working to convince Americans that aluminum furniture was the modern way to keep your house “in step” with the times…
…and finally, RCA Victor was offering an early version of the LP record, so you wouldn’t have to stop necking to turn the damn record…
…on to our cartoons, we begin with Gardner Rea…
…John Reehill gave us a lover who probably watched too many romance movies…
…contrasting with this fellow illustrated by Carl Rose, who doesn’t lift a finger to find some romance…
…and while we are on the subject of love, here is a modern twist offered by Barbara Shermund…
…William Crawford Galbraith gave us a far more detached view of the game of love…
…while Helen Hokinson found an attraction of a different sort with one of her “girls”…
…Alan Dunn looked in on the baking business, industrial-sized…
…and we end with Richard Decker, and the price of war…
Anticipated in science fiction in the early 20th century, television was one of those signifiers of a better life in the future, and the popular press drove home that message with its breathless reporting on the latest advancements. E.B. White, on the other hand, found the latest experiment in television to be less than thrilling, maintaining prescience of mind to see things as they were, and what they might become.
Oct. 31, 1931 cover by Helen Hokinson.
In “The Talk of the Town” White wrote about the unusual demonstration of television to an audience in the B.S. Moss playhouse. They were treated to a broadcast from the Guild Theatre, just one block away.
…now to the popular press, the demonstration — contrary to White’s account — was a wonder to behold:
Modern Mechanics magazine, January 1932.
The actual product, however, had a long way to go…
CAN YOU SEE ME NOW?…Top row, left to right, British adventurer Carveth Wells and actresses Theresa Helburn and Margaret Barker did their best to entertain audiences a block away via a television broadcast, but the results were more like the images on the bottom row, especially the one at right. (art-books.com/brynmawr.edu/onetuberadio.com)
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Comeback Kid
Not well known today, but in the early 20th century Maude Adams (1872-1953) was a household name; her touring productions beginning around the turn of the century made her the most popular actress in America, and she sealed that deal in 1905 when she played Peter Pan on Broadway to great acclaim. Her success continued until 1918, when the Spanish flu pandemic nearly claimed her life. After recovering from the illness she retired from acting and turned her attention to making improvements in electric lighting, creating an industry standard for both stage and film. When she returned to acting in 1931, it was big news, and “The Talk of the Town” was there to tell us about it. Excerpts:
STAGING A COMEBACK…Maude Adams, left, circa 1897. At right, Adams portrayed Portia in her 1931 production of The Merchant of Venice, with Otis Skinner, who portrayed Shylock. (Pinterest/Bookmice)
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Rags to Rags
The New Yorker departed from its usual profiles of the rich, powerful and/or famous and focused instead on a “Bowery Bum” named John McGoorty. Also unusual was the profile’s author, Russel Crouse, better known then and now and as an American playwright and librettist. Appropriately, Reginald Marsh lent his “Ashcan School” style to the illustration. Here are some excerpts:
NOT MUCH TO SMILE ABOUT…Berenice Abbott photograph of a Bowery restaurant in 1935, when the street was lined with flophouses. (Wikipedia)
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From Our Advertisers
We begin with some lovely color ads…the makers of the gasoline additive Ethyl (active ingredient, lead) continued their series of nature-themed ads…
…while Budweiser, perhaps anticipating the end of Prohibition, reminded readers of the refreshing flavor of its beer, even if it was non-alcoholic…
…R.J. Reynolds reminded women smokers that their Camel cigarettes left no after-taste…
…while Lorillard went a step further and claimed its Old Gold brand made a smoker downright kissable…
…the makers of Pepperell Peeress sheets and pillowcases offered this “Talk of the Town” parody to promote their wares…
…illustrator Frank McIntosh, known for his Art Deco travel drawings, (and who contributed just four drawings to the New Yorker), gave us this stylish illustration for Guillaume Lenthéric’s famed parfums…
…New Yorker cartoonist/illustrator H.O. Hofman contributed this drawing on behalf of the Artists and Writers Guild, offering their designer bridge cards…
…and speaking of bridge, we have Alan Dunn opening our cartoons…
…and in a less refined setting, we have this from Raymond Thayer, another contributor of just four drawings to the New Yorker…
…and this entry from Carl Rose reminds us of where we are in history, namely the Depression…
…James Thurber continued his exploration of the mysterious encounters between the sexes…
…and we end with Alice Harvey, and one unlikely play date…
From the Upper East Side and the vaudeville stage to the shining lights of Hollywood went the Marx Brothers in 1931, starring in their first movie written especially for screen rather than adapted from one of their stage shows.
Oct. 17, 1931 cover by Adolph K. Kronengold.
Monkey Business also their first film to be shot outside of New York. The brothers’ first two pictures — The Cocoanuts (1929) and Animal Crackers (1930) — were filmed at Paramount’s Astoria Studios in Queens. Film critic John Mosher found their latest movie to be a “particular prize” among the somewhat ordinary fare being cranked out of Hollywood. It featured the four as stowaways on an ocean liner bound for America, and that’s all you really need to know, because like most of their films it cut quickly to the chase…
Monkey Business was the first film to label the troupe the “Four Marx Brothers” (a billing that would continue through their Paramount years). A fifth brother, Gummo, left the team early and went on to launch a successful raincoat business.
NEVER A DULL MOMENT…The Marx Brothers were up to their usual antics in their first Hollywood-made film, Monkey Business. At top, Groucho performs an egg trick on a society couple; at bottom, he does a bit of hoofing with comedian Thelma Todd. (IMDB)
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Monkey’s Uncles
There was a New Yorker connection to Monkey Business — S. J. Perelman‚ a frequent contributor of humorous shorts to the magazine, was one of the screenwriters for the film. And it just so happens that one of Perelman’s shorts was in the Oct. 17 issue, and it was a doozy…
MAKE ‘EM LAUGH…Writer and cartoonist Will B. Johnstone (left) wrote the screenplay for Monkey Business with S. J. Perelman, right, in a 1935 portrait by Ralph Steiner. (Meg Farrell/Yale University)A promotional cartoon for Monkey Business by Will B. Johnstone. He also created the cartoon character of The Tax Payer wearing only a barrel held up by suspenders. It was a regular feature in the New York World-Telegram. (Meg Farrell via travsd.wordpress.com)
* * *
Office Chatter
E.B. White called out a couple of his New Yorker colleagues in “Notes and Comment” as he mused about “lady poets” and their disillusionment with the menfolk. The “Selma Robinson” he mentions was a young writer who had just published her first collection of poems titled City Child…
…White then moved on the subject of matrimony and advice columns, zeroing in on Dorothy Dix, the most widely read woman journalist of her time with an estimated 60 million readers turning daily to her syndicated column…
LIGHTEN UP ON THE LOVEBIRDS, DOROTHY, E.B. White seemed to suggest in his “Notes and Comment” item about syndicated advice columnist Dorothy Dix. (NYT)
* * *
So Much for Prognosticators
The New Yorker ran an amusing two-page spread that contained the quotes of prominent writers, politicians, businessmen and economists — month by month since the October 1929 market crash — who predicted a swift end to the Depression and better times just around the corner. An except below (note the reprise of Otto Soglow’s manhole cartoon).
* * *
It Pays to be Funny
Richard Lockridge (1898–1982) was a reporter for the New York Sun when he began submitting comic sketches to the New Yorker such the one excerpted below. Later sketches would include the characters Mr. and Mrs. North. In the late 1930s Lockridge would collaborate with his wife, Frances Louise Davis, on a detective novel, combining her plot with his Mr. and Mrs. North characters to launch a series of 26 novels that would be adapted for stage, film, radio and television.
PARTNERS IN CRIME…Richard and Frances Lockridge examine one of their mystery novels in this undated book jacket photo. At right, the cover of their second “North” book, with cover illustration by Helen Hokinson (note the similarities of the Mr. and Mrs. North characters to Richard and Frances).
* * *
Land Barge
The “Motors” column featured the latest luxury offering from Germany, the massive 12-cylinder Maybach Zeppelin, which would set you back a cool $12,800 in 1931 (roughly $200,000 in today’s currency). Named for the company’s production of Zeppelin engines in the World War I era, the car weighed 6,600 pounds (3,000 kg).
THE 12-CYLINDER Maybach Zeppelin was not known for its economy.
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From Our Advertisers
The new Chevrolet Six was no Maybach, but the folks at GM nevertheless tried to suggest it was a car for the posh set…
…when Kleenex was first introduced to American consumers in 1924 it was marketed as a tissue for removing cold cream, and wasn’t sold as a disposable handkerchief until the 1930s…
…and contrary to the wisdom of the ages, the makers of Old Gold cigarettes tried to convince us that their cigarettes would not leave smokers with bad breath or yellowed teeth…
…Winnie-the-Pooh, or here referred to as “Winnie, The Pooh,” was only five years old when this ad was created for Macy’s, and even before Disney got his hands on him the bear was being turned into various consumer products including baby bowls, handkerchiefs and lamps…
…the color ads in the early New Yorker were quite striking, such as this full-pager for Martex towels…
…or this one for Arrow shirts, featuring a determined coach making an important point to his leatherheads before the big game…
…on to our cartoons, we have Otto Soglow’s Little King engaging in some sport of his own…
…Alan Dunn showed us a meter reader who probably needed to come up for some fresh air…
…William Crawford Galbraith gave us a sugar daddy without a clue…
…E. McNerney showed us another pair that begged the question “what comes next?”…
…this Mary Petty cartoon recalls Carl Rose’s famous “I say its spinach” cartoon — and Mamma has every right to say “the hell with it” in this case…
…in this William Stieg entry, a father teaches his young charge the art of rubbernecking…
…and Don Herold gave us a peek at what the little dears really talk about while their parents exchange the latest gossip…
…on to the Oct. 24, 1931 issue…
Oct. 24, 1931 cover by Rose Silver.
…where we find the latest edition of Frank Sullivan’s satirical newspaper, The Blotz, which occupied a two-page spread (excerpt below)…
…and featured this masthead of sorts (with James Thurber art)…
…and another Thurber contribution as The Blotz’s political cartoonist…
…more colorful ads to enjoy, including this nighthawk view of an apartment house…
…and this ad for Lucky Strike cigarettes, featuring 20-year-old Platinum Blonde star Jean Harlow (what is she leaning on?) who probably shouldn’t have smoked because her health was always a bit fragile — she would be dead in less than six years…
…ands then we have our latest high society shill for cold cream, Marchioness of Milford Haven, aka Nadejda Mikhailovna Mountbatten, aka Countess Nadejda de Torby, aka Princess George of Battenberg…she was probably best known for her part in the 1934 Gloria Vanderbilt custody trial, when a a former maid of Vanderbilt’s mother, Gloria Morgan, testified that the Marchioness had a lesbian relationship with Morgan…
…Helen Hokinson continued loaning one of her “girls” to Frigidaire to extol the wonders of their seemingly indestructible refrigerators…
…our Oct. 24 cartoons feature Garrett Price, who brought us the exciting world of the traveling salesman…
…A. S. Foster served up an Italian stereotype…
…I. Klein, on the other hand, turned a stereotype on its head…
…and we end with Rea Irvin, who gave us what I believe was a first in the New Yorker — a cartoon character breaking the fourth wall…
…by the way, M.F.H. stands for Master of Fox Hounds…I had to look it up.
While many Americans partied through the Roaring Twenties, there were a few voices out there, barely audible, that warned of economic collapse and another world war.
Oct. 3, 1931 cover by Helen Hokinson.
The humorist and New Yorker contributor Frank Sullivan was among the few who took notice of the dire predictions (of war, anyway) and turned it into a funny take on how a European war might unfold. Excerpts:
Sullivan’s last line is a wordplay on “air,” and not likely a prediction of the horrible firebombing and V-2 attacks that would devastate Europe in the following decade.
In Sullivan’s day two notable predictions of war came from British economist John Maynard Keynes and British author Hector Charles Bywater. In his 1919 book, The Economic Consequences of the Peace, Keynes warned that “unstable elements,” destroyed during the Great War (WWI), had not been replaced with more stable networks or institutions. Bywater’s prescient 1925 novel, The Great Pacific War, featured a hypothetical future war between Japan and the U.S. that predicted a number of events in World War Two’s Pacific Theatre.
I SEE DEAD PEOPLE…Economist John Maynard Keynes and British author Hector Charles Bywater both didn’t like what they saw coming on the horizon.
There were reasons for Keynes to be concerned. Germany found many ways to subvert restrictions imposed by the Treaty of Versailles, and continued to make technological advances in armaments and air power. Moreover, the Treaty’s humiliating terms and demands for costly reparations would lead to a rise in German nationalism in the midst of mass unemployment and a volatile economy. In just a little over a year Adolf Hitler and his Nazi Party would seize control of the German state.
And as Bywater feared, the Japanese invaded Manchuria (under false pretenses) on Sept. 18, 1931, and then ignored orders to withdraw from the League of Nations (which had been established by a covenant included in the Treaty of Versailles). Japanese warlords were emboldened by the ease of this takeover and the toothless response from the international community. This scenario would be replayed by the Nazis when they invaded Czechoslovakia in 1939.
UGH, IT’S THAT GUY…Clockwise, from top left, Adolph Hitler rolls into Weimar as the Nazi Party continued to gain power in 1930; Hitler youth out for a bike ride in 1932; Japanese troops celebrate their easy invasion of Manchuria in September 1931; political cartoon illustrated Japan’s attitude toward international treaties. (Wikipedia/Pinterest)
* * *
The Man Who Would Not Be King
The world that was gradually setting the stage for World War II was also the world of Edward VIII, the Prince of Wales. A renowned womanizer and major disappointment to his father, George V, this heir to the British throne would begin a secret affair with American socialite Wallis Simpson that would later lead to his abdication as king after a reign of just 326 days. In a two-part profile, the New Yorker’s London correspondent Anthony Gibbs could already see that Edward would not be like other monarchs, this lonely “fish out of water” bored with court protocol and finding escape in a bottle of whisky. Excerpts from Part I (caricature by Al Frueh):
HITLER HONEYMOON…Edward VIII abdicated the British throne in December 1936 and married the newly divorced Wallis Simpson in June 1937. Four months later (right) they would pay a visit to Adolph Hitler and his thugs at Hitler’s mountain retreat above Berchtesgaden. Edward was known to be sympathetic to the Nazis, and favored the type of appeasement that would embolden Der Führer to invade Czechoslovakia and much of Europe beginning in 1939. (Pinterest/Wikipedia)
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From Our Advertisers
The opening of the new Waldorf-Astoria Hotel on Park Avenue had everyone and their dog getting in on a piece of the action, including manufacturers who hoped to associate their wares with the world’s tallest hotel…we begin with an ad from the hotel’s promoters…
…I surprised to find pedestrian products such as rayon curtains and aluminum chairs associated with the luxury hotel…
…but perhaps the novelty of these things made them “must-haves” associated with modern living in 1931…this ad from the Oct 10 issue…
…one habit of modern living was cigarette smoking, and thanks to aggressive advertising droves of women were joining the menfolk in this activity…
…Camels were originally promoted as a woman’s cigarette, and in 1931 R.J. Reynolds shifted their ad style from chic illustrations of disinterested, continental types, such as the one below by Carl Erickson from the March 21, 1931 issue (and imitated by the Spud ad above)…
…to photographs of fresh-faced American women…
…Barney’s ran this recurring ad (with illustration by Peter Arno) in the back pages of the New Yorker, the latest touting the reopening of Barney Gallant’s “continental cabaret”…
GOOD TIME BARNEY…Barney Gallant was a celebrity and a hero to many New Yorkers for his defiance of Prohibition. At left, actor/writer/producer John Murray Anderson (seated) and Gallant in a photo by Nickolas Muray. At right, illustration by Joseph Golinken of Gallant’s speakeasy Speako de Luxe at 19 Washington Square North. The first New Yorker to be prosecuted under the Volstead Act (serving 30 days in the Tombs), Gallant operated several Bohemian speakeasies in Greenwich Village during the 1920s. Stanley Walker (writing in his 1933 history, The Night Club Era) described the clientele as “youngsters with strange stirrings in their breasts, who had come from remote villages on the prairie; women of social position and money who wanted to do things — all sorts of things — in a bohemian setting; businessmen who had made quick money and wanted to breathe the faintly naughty atmosphere in safety, and ordinary people who got thirsty now and then and wanted to sit down and have a drink.” (Metropolitan Museum/New York Historical Society)
…New Yorker cartoonist William Crawford Galbraith picked up some extra income illustrating this ad for The New York American…
…which segues into our cartoons, beginning with Alan Dunn and the art of the dance,
…Barbara Shermund, who showed us that a war (movie) is hell…
…William Steig continued to develop his repertoire of cartoons with precocious children…
…Kemp Starrett gave us a salesman who put more than his foot in the door…
…James Thurber continued his ongoing “dialogue” between the sexes..,
…William Crawford Galbraith again, with his take on “Upstairs, Downstairs”…
…Rea Irvin also exploring the theme in this two-page spread (click to enlarge)…
…and we end with another by Kemp Starrett, and the blasé attitude New Yorkers might display before the world’s tallest building…
When Earl Carroll’sVanities hit the Broadway revue scene in 1923, it faced strong competition from George White’sScandals and the long-running Ziegfeld Follies. Carroll’s answer: More of everything.
Sept. 5, 1931 cover by Theodore Haupt.
That included more nudity than the other revues. Critics, including the New Yorker’sRobert Benchley, found the nudity gratuitous, a titillating distraction from what was otherwise a mess of a show. It also landed Carroll in court from time to time on charges of public indecency. All of this, of course, was just more publicity to drive audiences to his theatre at 753 Seventh Avenue, which he built in 1922 and then partially tore down just nine years later to replace it with an even grander venue. This is where Benchley found himself on the evening of August 27 — at the grand opening of the Earl Carroll Theatre and the 1931 edition of the Vanities. Benchley found nothing grand about it:
AUTOGRAPHS, ANYONE?…Accompanied by his Vanities showgirls, Earl Carroll leaves the Essex Market Police Court on July 20,1930, after appearing to answer charges of public indecency. Police raided a Vanities matinee on July 9, arresting eleven including famed burlesque dancer Faith Bacon, who performed in nothing but fans made of ostrich feathers. No doubt police were tipped off by critics who called the 1930 edition the “nudest” cast in American theatre history. From the looks on their faces, it seems even the police enjoyed the spectacle. (Worthpoint)IS THERE A PROBLEM, OFFICER?…Faith Bacon in a less-revealing pose with the ostrich-feather fans that brought the police ‘a calling. (fanpix.net)
Carroll’s ambitions were always big, whether it was the size or lavishness of his stage shows or the Art Deco theatre (designed by George W. Keister) he erected in 1931 in answer to Flo Ziegfeld’s 1927 Joseph Urban-designed theatre on Sixth Avenue. With 3,000 seats, Carroll’s theatre was nearly twice the size of Ziegfeld’s.
THEY DON’T COME FOR THE SCRIPTWRITING…Earl Carroll made it clear what audiences could expect in his 1931 Art Deco-style theatre, which featured black velvet-covered walls relieved with gold and silver-colored highlights. Its 3,000 seats made it one of the largest theatres in the world. Clockwise, from top left, portrait of Carroll (a gift from the 1930 Vanities showgirls) flanked by busts of Vanities girls Doris Andrese and Beryl Wallace in the theatre lobby; sign above theatre entrance; a two-page spread from the theatre’s “Beauty Souvenir” booklet; cover of the booklet, featuring singer Lillian Roth. (New York Historical Society).DECO DRAMA…Clockwise, from top left, Earl Carroll circa 1925; ceiling detail inside the Earl Carroll Theatre; mezzanine lounge; the stage. (New York Historical Society).
The show itself left Benchley baffled, a mishmash of lights, colors, and effects including a drooling dinosaur that dropped a naked woman on stage for a dance number…
LAUNCH SITE….The Vanities stage helped launch the careers of many entertainers. Clockwise, from top left, undated photo of a Vanities production — some shows would feature more than 100 women on stage at one time; singer Lillian Roth was a star attraction; Vanities alumni included William Demarest (Uncle Charlie!), Jack Benny and Vincente Minnelli. (assumption.edu/flickr.com/classicmoviehub.com/amazon.com/sensesofcinema.com)
This wasn’t last word from the New Yorker on the new theatre; the Sept. 12 issue featured these observations by Creighton Peet:
In the end, Carroll’s ambitions were too big for the deepening Depression, and just six months after his theatre’s opening he would lose it to creditors. The property would be snapped up by rival Florenz Ziegfeld and renamed the Casino, but the Ziegfeld connection would be short-lived; Ziegfeld would die a few months later in July 1932. Later that year another rival, George White, would take over the venue to stage his Music Hall Varieties, which ended in 1933 with middling results. The theatre would go through several more tenants — including Billy Rose — until 1940 when the discount “dime store” Woolworth’s would move in, demolishing the lobby and walling off the remaining ceiling and walls. Woolworth’s would close the location in the late 1980s — the store, and the last remnants of the Earl Carroll Theatre, would be demolished in 1990.
CLOSING NUMBER…At left, a sneak peek behind the false walls of Woolworth’s in 1988 shows a detail of the theatre’s proscenium, ceiling and sidewall. At right, top to bottom, the second Earl Carroll Theatre at 7th Avenue & 50th Street; the Woolworth’s store that replaced it, circa 1980; the site today. (Large image from the book Lost Broadway Theatres, via drivingfordeco.com/Google Maps)
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From Our Advertisers
Fall is upon us, and so the social season begins, according to the Hotel St. Regis…
…and what better way to prepare for the season than to acquire a new mink coat…
…maybe politics and world affairs were more your bag, in which case you probably wanted to get a subscription to the Herald Tribune and read the latest from commentator Walter Lippmann…
…the makers of Marlboro cigarettes, an upstart brand that initially targeted women, continued with their prize contests, but now they began courting men as well…
…on the other hand, the more established brand Chesterfield had the resources to run a color back-cover ad with endorsements from the brother-sister dance team Fred and Adele Astaire…
…Fleishmann’s continued to run their full-page ads touting the wonders of daily yeast consumption (“Eat three cakes a day”). The ads were there because Raoul Fleishmann used his wealth from the family baking business to keep the New Yorker afloat during its fledgling years…
…Farrar and Rinehart announced the arrival of Otto Soglow’s first book, Pretty Pictures…
…here is the cover of the book…
…and we move on to the cartoons with the character that would make Soglow rich and famous…The Little King…
…although Fleischmann likely saved the New Yorker with large infusions of cash, its cartoonists, including Gardner Rea, still took an occasional poke at the company’s health claims…
…anticipating his “Small Fry” cartoons, William Steig finds two of them examining the wonders of human physiology…
…Rea Irvin looked in on some stuffy Western Union censors…
…newcomer Robert Day illustrated the challenges of a doorman (Day would be a longtime contributor)…
…Garrett Price found humor abuzz between the bold and the meek…
…Alan Dunn tracked down a clueless hunter…
…and we end with Leonard Dove, who takes flight and anticipates our next installment…
A New Yorker State of Mind 