Reginald Marsh – A New Yorker State of Mind

And Now We Are Nine

Above: It took a few issues for the editors to sort out regular features and their order of appearance. The opening section of Issue No. 1 featured the famous Rea Irvin masthead that would introduce “The Talk of Town” for many issues to come. In Issue No. 1, however, “Of All Things” appeared first under the masthead, followed by “The Talk of the Town." Let us hope the magazine restores the original Rea Irvin masthead for its 100th anniversary.

Despite the lingering Depression The New Yorker entered its ninth year on strong financial footing. With nearly equal numbers of subscribers and single copy sales, circulation would approach 125,000 in 1934, with more than $2.2 million in advertising income.

Feb. 17, 1934 cover by **Rea Irvin** (naturally).

In his “Notes and Comment,” E.B. White commented on the “more vigorous times” the magazine was enjoying, declaring “it is fine to be nine.”

THE NEW YORKER SEVEN…In 1924, baking product heir **Raoul Fleischmann** put up $25,000 to help **Harold Ross** get his new magazine off the ground. To assuage Fleischmann’s doubts regarding his investment, Ross persuaded some of his Algonquin Round Table cronies to appear on the magazine’s purely ceremonial masthead. The seven who appeared on the first masthead were, from top left, **Ralph Barton, Marc Connelly, Rea Irvin,** and **George S. Kaufman;** bottom row, from left, are **Alice Duer Miller, Dorothy Parker**, and Alexander Woollcott.

* * *

Daffy Dilettante

Another Algonquin Round Table crony, Harpo Marx, was a skilled artist when it came to comedy, pantomime, or the harp, but when he decided to take up a brush and palette he struggled to properly paint a female nude. In this account from “The Talk of the Town,” Harpo eventually abandoned his painting and switched places with the model.

BRUSHING UP ON HIS ART…Undated photo of **Harpo Marx** putting finishing touches on his painting of an accordion player; Harpo was a one of the Algonquin Round Table originals: a 1919 photo features (standing, left to right) **Art Samuels** and **Harpo Marx;** (sitting) **Charles MacArthur, Dorothy Parker,** and **Alexander Woollcott**. (Twitter/Wikipedia)

* * *

Ode to Faraway Lands

A renowned author of children’s poetry, David McCord (1897-1997), was also a frequent contributor to The New Yorker for thirty years (1926-56). For the Feb. 17 issue he penned these sonnets to the Baedeker travel guide.

* * *

Wimpy Vernacular

Architecture, art and cultural critic Lewis Mumford paused in his criticism of everything from liquor stores to cheap restaurants to offer some surprising praise to his city’s “black-and-white hamburger palaces.”

RED MEAT RIVALS White Tower and White Castle vied for customers in 1930s New York. Above, a 1933 photo of a White Tower in the 200 block of 2nd Avenue; below, a circa 1930 photo of a White Castle in the Bronx. (gothamist.com/Cision)

* * *

From Our Advertisers

Advertising income reached an all-time high at The New Yorker in 1934, and it showed with the numerous color ads enticing travel to Bermuda…

…or to the French wine country…

…Hiram Walker presented their Canadian Club whisky on what appeared to be a cloth napkin…

…artist Hans Flato continued his unusual Ruppert’s Beer series of mannequin people (and dogs) going about their lives stuck to yellow discs…

…according to the Ruppert’s ad, for six bottle caps you could get a tin coaster like those pictured below…

…from magicians and salesmen to sportsmen and high society, the folks pushing Camel cigarettes seemed to try every angle to get their product into the mouths of as many consumers as possible…

…the makers of Spud menthol cigarettes, on the other hand, tried a little humor to get smokers hooked on their “mouth happiness”…

…as one of the world’s most popular car brands, Chevrolet has long been considered a car for the masses, although this ad campaign launched in 1934 suggested that the ubiquitous Chevy was just the car for a connoisseur of the finer things…

…the staid luxury auto maker Pierce Arrow broke with tradition by placing this very modern, minimalist ad…

…the folks at Steinway also adopted a modern look with this single column ad touting the durability of their grand pianos…

…The Viking Press took out this full-page ad to announce the publication of Alexander Woollcott’s While Rome Burns, a collection of some of Woollcott’s writings for The New Yorker and other magazines…

…according to the ad, for six bucks you could get one of 500 limited edition signed copies…as of this writing, the inscribed and signed edition below was available for $350…

…on to our cartoonists, Al Frueh offered up this interpretation of Ziegfeld entertainers Willie Howard and Fannie Brice…

…Helen Hokinson took the plunge with 1930s water aerobics…

…Kemp Starrett demonstrated how beauty is in the eye of the beholder…

…Reginald Marsh returned, taking temporary leave from life on the streets to look at life above the streets…

…James Thurber’s “War Between Men And Women” took some new twists…

…and we end with Carl Rose, and one man’s solution to being stuck in the middle…

Next Time: Rocky’s Cover-up…

Under the Boardwalk

Kay Boyle was thirty and still cutting her teeth as a writer and political activist when the New Yorker published her short story “Black Boy,” told through an unnamed narrator who recalls a childhood visit to the seaside.

The narrator remembers the days when she rode her horse along the beach while her grandfather watched from a rolling chair, pushed along the boardwalk by various young Black boys. In the following excerpts, the grandfather asks one of the boys for his name, but is it clear he doesn’t really want to get to know him, and through his teasing suggests he isn’t even worthy of an identity. Later in the story the girl befriends the boy, who dwells beneath the boardwalk and dreams of a better life. When the grandfather learns of this budding friendship, he warns about the possibility of harm coming from the boy (two excerpts):

THE LONG, CHAOTIC LIFE of writer and activist **Kay Boyle** (1902–1992) ranged from fights against racism and fascism in the 1930s to protests against the Vietnam War in the 1960s and against nuclear weapons into the 1990s. (1941 photograph by **George Platt Lynes**, courtesy The Kay Boyle Papers, Morris Library, Southern Illinois University)

The final paragraphs describe how the girl falls from her horse, and the shocking consequences of the boy coming to her aid.

SEPARATE AND NOT EQUAL…**Kay Boyle** employed a boardwalk setting in her 1932 short story “Black Boy” to underscore the stark divisions between races in American society. Clockwise, from top left, a 1914 postcard from Atlantic City; on the Atlantic City Boardwalk, circa 1905; sheet music for a popular 1905 song; a dour-looking group being pushed along the Atlantic City Boardwalk, circa 1905. (seesaw.typepad.com/bygonely.com/reddit.com)

* * *

Potemkin Park

In his “Notes and Comment,” E.B. White questioned the need, and appropriateness, of a wood and plaster Federal Hall replica in Bryant Park, which at the time was a neglected patch of land behind the New York Public Library and a favorite spot for the city’s homeless, their numbers rapidly growing during one of the worst years of the Depression (unemployment hovered near 25 percent).

To add insult to injury, the area around the replica was fenced off and required an admission fee of 25 cents. White commented:

ERECTILE DYSFUNCTION…This flimsy Federal Hall replica erected in Bryant Park in 1932 symbolized some of the problems that beset New York City in one of the worst years of the Depression. Under Mayor **Jimmy Walker**, the committee in charge of the replica was filled with corrupt Tammany cronies who quickly depleted the committee’s funds. It is no surprise that the replica was unpopular, especially with its admission fee of 25 cents, roughly equivalent to $5 today (consider that sales clerks in 1932, if they were lucky to have a job, earned perhaps $15 a week). (Museum of the City of New York)

* * *

Intermural Murals

Art critic Murdock Pemberton approached the Museum of Modern Art’s newest exhibition of American muralists with a bit of suspicion, although he was correct in surmising that the Rockefeller Center was shopping for muralists, but as we now know it was not an American, but a Mexican artist (Diego Rivera) who would enter that scene and stir things up.

Among other works, MoMA visitors viewed Ben Shahn’s study for a three-part composition titled “The Passion of Sacco and Vanzetti”…

…and a work by the New Yorker’s own Reginald Marsh titled “Post-War America”…

* * *

Boop’s Boo-Boo

We return to E.B. White and his musings regarding actress and singer Helen Kane (1904–1966), who filed a $250,000 (equivalent to nearly $5 million in 2021) infringement lawsuit against cartoonist Max Fleischer and Paramount Studios, claiming that the popular Betty Boop character was based on Kane’s personality and image.

BOOP SCOOP…Comparison between **Helen Kane** and the cartoon star Betty Boop was published in *Photoplay’s* April 1932 issue, one month before Kane’s lawsuit was filed. The suit was settled two years later, the court finding insufficient evidence to support Kane’s claim. (Wikipedia)

* * *

From Rags to Rackets

Lois Long lived at the center of the 1920s speakeasy scene, but while she partied she also kept a critical eye on her surroundings, and when she later moved on to fashion criticism (“On And Off The Avenue”) she maintained the same combination of enthusiasm and shrewdness as she took aim at the “lusty fellows of the fashion rackets”…

JUST BROWSING, THANKS…**Lois Long** kept a skeptical eye on the New York fashion “racket” in the 1930s. Above, an unidentified model sporting a red velvet ensemble during a fashion show in 1933. (New York Daily News)

* * *

From Our Advertisers

We begin with yet another insecticide-themed cartoon from Dr. Seuss, this time using the experimental medium of television to get his point across…

…R.J. Reynolds continued to push their Camels on the growing market of women smokers, here mixing their product with a basket of fruit to suggest freshness and vitality…

…the folks at B. Altman touted their new outdoor furniture line, placing it in a setting available to a very select few New Yorkers…

…we kick off the cartoons with Peter Arno at his best…

…Alice Harvey gave voice to one woman’s thoughts on children…

…Leonard Dove found spirits dwelling among dusty bones…

…James Thurber gave us his take on the housewife eating bonbons trope…I’m not suggesting that Thurber was the first to illustrate this stereotype, but I’m not finding any references to housewives and bonbons predating the 1950s…something for a dissertation out there, if it hasn’t already been done…

…William Steig continued his exploration into the world of the Small Fry, offering up a rare image of baseball in the early New Yorker…

…and we close the May 14 issue with I. Klein, and one sidewalk salesman looking for a bonafide endorsement…

…on to May 21, 1932…

May 21, 1932 cover by **Helen Hokinson.**

…where we find E.B. White sharing his thoughts on the Lindbergh kidnapping and its tragic result…

BAD NEWS ON THE DOORSTEP…News of the death of **Charles and Anne Lindbergh’s** kidnapped baby transfixed the country in the spring of 1932. (New York Times)

* * *

No Immaculate Conception, This

It must have been hard to be Lewis Mumford, so knowledgable in the arts, architecture and city planning, and yet rather helpless in encouraging thoughtful growth in a place that spouted buildings like mushrooms and paved roads (thanks to Robert Moses) almost as fast as cars could drive across them. These excerpts offer some of Mumford’s thoughts on the matter:

For Mumford’s second point, he soundly denounced a plan to place an obelisk in Battery Park. The 1929 proposal called for an 800-foot obelisk at the junction of Broadway and Greenwich Street:

OVER COMPENSATING, PERHAPS…Designed by architect **Eric Gugler**, the proposed granite obelisk for Battery Park would have been windowless, 80 feet square at its base and rising to a height of 800 feet. Thankfully it was never, ahem, “erected.” (NYC Urbanism @nycurbanism)

Mumford also addressed the matter of the Central Park Zoo, and its proposed relocation:

Happily for Mumford, and for former Gov. Al Smith (see caption), the zoo would be revitalized and remain in Central Park.

MIRACLES OF MOSES…Although **Lewis Mumford** would often be at odds with the powerful park commissioner **Robert Moses**, it was Moses who ensured that the Central Park Zoo would remain in the park. The remodeled zoo opened with great fanfare on December 2, 1934, and Moses’ old friend and political mentor **Al Smith** was designated honorary zookeeper. Smith, who lived just across from the zoo at 820 Fifth Avenue, visited almost daily. Structured as a quadrangle with a sea lion pool at its center, the Central Park Zoo is pictured above in August 1942. (nycgovparks.org)

* * *

From Our Advertisers

Many advertisers played to the Anglophilic tendencies of New Yorker readers, particular ones selling garments to the sporting gentry who aped their British cousins in such pursuits as polo and dressage…here we have “play clothes” from the menswear company Rogers Peet…

…and this swell get-up (below) from Henri Bendel…both Peet and Bendel were well-known in the 1930s. Cole Porter even referred to both companies in his songs…here is the refrain from “I Introduced” (from the 1919 show Hitchy-Koo):

…”I presented Mister Peet to Mister Rogers”…

and even more famously Porter wrote these lines in his 1934 song “You’re the Top”:

…”You’re a Bendel Bonnet / a Shakespeare Sonnet”…

…Rogers Peet closed its doors in the 1980s, and Bendel folded in 2019…

…even during the Depression, almost anyone could spring for a ten-cent bar of Lux soap, and over the years it was famous for its splashy ads (two-page spreads in the New Yorker were common) and dozens of celebrity endorsements…Lux isn’t as dominant in the U.S. today, but it remains a major international brand, now sold and marketed by the British multinational Unilever, especially in Asia…back to 1932, the Lux ad below featured Lupe Velez — known as “The Mexican Spitfire,” she was a big star in the 30s but is perhaps best known today for her sad, tragic death in 1944…the Lux ad also displayed the Aber Twins — a Ziegfeld act that featured Arlene and Charlene Aber who weren’t really twins but sisters born 18 months apart…

…if you lived in New York in the 1920s and early 30s you probably would have known about the sometime artist/designer Don Dickerman and his themed Greenwich Village restaurants — especially The Pirate’s Den — which inspired this line of highball glasses (yeah, Prohibition was still around, but who cared?)…sadly these glasses didn’t help save The Pirate’s Den, which thanks to the Depression went bankrupt in 1932…

…speaking of Prohibition, Anheuser-Busch took advantage of laws that allowed for the production of near-beer containing one-half percent alcohol…

…if you couldn’t drink you could still eat to your heart’s content, that is if you were this fat cat and not some starving fellow in a bread line…

…on to our cartoons, Helen Hokinson took us pet shopping…

…Garrett Price offered up a stereotype in a courtroom setting…

…and reminiscent of humor in the vein of Ralph Barton, Rea Irvin launched a series of the world’s “beauty spots”…

Next Time: A Visit to Minskyville…

Back in the USSR

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.

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)

* * *

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.

* * *

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’s** *Eloise* 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…

Next Time: Winter Games…

Babylon Berlin

The name of this post comes from one of my favorite television series, Babylon Berlin, a lavishly produced German neo-noir drama that takes place during the final years of the Weimar Republic, or precisely where we are in the timeline of this blog.

Jan. 9, 1932 cover by **Theodore Haupt.**

The tumultuous Weimar years of the 1920s and early 30s represented Germany’s initial flirtation with democracy, an experimental age at once filled with post-war angst and libertine ways, and this was especially true in Berlin where nearly every vice could be plied along its streets and alleyways and in countless clubs and cabarets. It was the setting for a decade of political turmoil, with communists (rival Bolsheviks and Trotskyites) to the left and national socialists (later Nazis) to the right, and in the middle a fledging democracy that ultimately could not hold the center. Janet Flanner, the New Yorker’s Paris correspondent, paid Berlin a visit just one year before Adolph Hitler would seize dictatorial power.

WORLDLY VIEW…**Janet Flanner’s** account of life in Berlin at the end of 1931 told of economic hardship and hinted at trouble to come, but it mostly depicted life as pictured at right at a Berlin tea dance. This was not a naive perspective, but rather one of a worldly mind not easily shocked by vice and upheaval. As the *New Yorker’s* longtime Paris correspondent, Flanner’s weekly letters during World War II would also make her a respected war correspondent. At left is an oft-reproduced portrait of Flanner, taken by **Berenice Abbott** in 1927. At right, a tea dance in the garden of the Hotel Esplanade in Berlin, 1928. (Clark Art Institute/ *Süddeutsche* *Zeitung*)

In this excerpt, Flanner saw life continuing at an oddly normal pace despite the hardships and the political tension that boiled behind the façade:

TRUNCATED VISION…Berlin looked to a Modernist future until **Adolph Hitler** put an end to the “un-German” Bauhaus style in 1933. Despite the economic collapse and political turmoil of 1931 Berlin, the city showcased remarkable technical progress, including a prototype high-speed train (left) that travelled at 230 km per hour (143 mph) from Hamburg to Berlin. At right, Berlin exhibition of Bauhaus-inspired buildings at the 1931 *Deutsche Bauausstellung*. The cavernous Hall 11, themed as “The Dwelling of Our Time,” was directed by **Mies van der Rohe.** It mostly displayed the output of his Bauhaus “Werkbund,” including a Mies-designed modern house. (Pinterest/Reichstarifvertrag)

THE OTHER BERLIN…at top, the Friedrichstrasse, Berlin’s “street of sin,” in the late 1920s; below right, prostitutes ply their trade in 1920s Berlin; and below left, buy cocaine capsules from a Berlin drug dealer, 1930. (ddr-postkarten-museum.de/Reddit/Wikipedia)

ANYTHING GOES…Clockwise, from top left, cabaret performance in Berlin that left little to the imagination; the Jockey bar mentioned by Flanner — it was frequented by A-listers such as Jean Cocteau, Andre Gide, Ernest Hemingway and **Marlene Dietrich**; the Eldorado gay night club in Berlin, 1932; performance of “A Slide on the Razor” at Berlin’s Haller Revue, 1923; the Europahaus, one of hundreds of cabarets in Weimar Berlin, 1931. (cabaret.berlin/Bundesarchiv/tribe.net/Wikipedia)

Toward the end of her article, Flanner noted that “Berliners are busy making a new race,” which is not a reference to Hitler’s “master race” (that would come later) but rather to a new generation overtaking the old. The final lines of this excerpt, however, suggest there might be trouble ahead…

NOT ALL FUN AND GAMES: Weimer Berlin was also a place of political and economic struggle that at times turned violent. From left, a Nazi youth is wounded during Berlin street violence amid Reichstag elections in 1932; a Berlin bank damaged during violent clashes between police and demonstrators in June 1931; Communist youths in Berlin demonstrate on May Day 1931. (Pinterest/Financial Times)

The party abruptly ended with Hitler’s takeover of the government in January 1933. The images below said it all:

NEW THEME, NEW OWNERSHIP…The Eldorado gay night club in Berlin before and after Nazi takeover of the German government. (lonesomereader.com)

* * *

Masses’ Mass Media

“The Talk of the Town” pondered the symbolism of the Daily News Building — from the inscription above its entrance to the place names on its massive lobby globe — which seemed to celebrate its readership, namely the common people.

CAN YOU FIND HOOTERVILLE?…the massive globe in the *Daily News* lobby (circa 1941), featured the names of small towns and cities along with major population centers; below, inscription “HE MADE SO MANY OF THEM” above the building’s entrance (atlasobscura.com)

* * *

Dem Bones

The New Yorker art critic Murdock Pemberton paid a visit to the Stieglitz Gallery to check out the latest works by Georgia O’Keeffe. He found that her themes were moving from the urban landscape of New York to the bleached simplicity of the Southwestern desert:

CHANGING HER TUNE…**Georgia O’Keeffe’s** *Cow’s Skull: Red, White, and Blue* (1931); O’Keeffe with one of her skull paintings, 1931. (metmuseum.org/Everett/CSU Archives)

* * *

Hyde-bound

Film critic John Mosher found much to like about Frederic March’s performance in Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and so did critics and Academy voters who bestowed a Best Actor award on the actor.

HEY, WE’RE PRE-CODE HERE…Bar singer Ivy Pierson (**Miriam Hopkins**) in a state of undress as she tries (unsuccessfully) to seduce Dr. Jekyll (**Frederic March**); when Jekyll turns into Mr. Hyde, however, the tables are turned, much to Ivy’s distress. (IMDB)

Mosher found, however, that other pictures playing at the time left much to be desired…

BAD GIRLS…From left, **Sylvia Sidney, Miriam Goldina** and **Esther Howard** in 1931’s *Ladies of the Big House*. (IMDB)

* * *

Modern Methods

Early in his writing career Richard Lockridge penned a series of comic sketches for the New Yorker, many of them featuring the characters Mr. and Mrs. North, who would inspire a 26-book series of detective novels. The Norths had yet to make an appearance, but here Lockridge had some fun with the makers of Chevrolets, who used a new-fangled method to promote their product. Excerpts:

FREEBIE…**Richard Lockridge** thanked the folks from Chevrolet for the free phonograph record, but passed on the automobile. (Ebay)

* * *

From Our Advertisers

The Annual National Automobile Show at Grand Central Palace kicked off the new year with a stunning lineup of new cars, but General Motors separated itself from the pack by exhibiting its wares at the new Waldorf-Astoria Hotel…I believe this unsigned illustration is by Peter Arno (note “Walrus” in background) but someone please correct me if I am wrong…

…the New Yorker’s advertising department reaped the benefits of the annual show, the Jan. 9 issue replete with ads from various companies…the makers of the Buffalo-based Pierce Arrow — a top-of-the-line luxury car — added a downscale version with a “New Eight” and deeply discounted their prices (which were still well above economy models offered by others)…

…the Depression would put an end to Pierce Arrow by 1938, but rival Lincoln would manage to hang on thanks to their own new “8” and the largess of parent Ford Motor Company…the Lincolns shown here are actually priced higher than the Pierce Arrows, $4300 for the 12 (vs $3185 for the PA 12) and $2900 for the 8 (vs. $2385 for the PA 8)…

…a bit more down the ladder we have venerable Oldsmobile, alas no longer with us (removed from GM’s lineup in 2014)…

…and a few more rungs down we have the DeSoto (a Chrysler product) and its “sleek” new radiator that was the talk of the auto show, and admired here by “Jimmy Flagg” (aka illustrator James Montgomery Flagg, perhaps best known for his 1917 Uncle Sam poster with the caption “I Want YOU for U.S. Army”)…the DeSoto was a real bargain, priced at under $700…

…and here are a few ads from companies long gone…like Pierce Arrow, Auburn (top left) struggled to sell its upscale cars during the Depression…however, the makers of another upscale brand, Packard (bottom right), were able to survive by favoring tried and true designs over gimmicky yearly changes…Hupmobile (top right) was known for its innovations, but a decision to build more expensive cars in the late 1920s put it into a bad position for the Depression-era market, and the company folded by 1939…when Hupmobile was on its last leg, it partnered with the ailing Graham-Paige Motor Company (bottom left), another company known for great designs, but combining two failing companies in this case yielded one larger failing company, and Hup and Graham went down together…

…the clever folks at Buick were way ahead of the others in marketing savvy, emphasizing an attractive, confident woman at the wheel of an unseen car, tapping into a previously untapped market (tobacco companies were busy doing the same)…

…as we see here from the folks who pushed the Chesterfield brand — in this ad aimed at the growing market of women smokers, you don’t see the carton, but what you do see are people waxing philosophical about smoking, quality smoking, that is, and it’s no mistake that the woman is sitting on the arm of the chair, receiving this “wisdom” from her husband…

…even when a man isn’t present, Chesterfield still perched the woman on the arm of the chair, as seen in this ponderous New Yorker ad from the previous year…

…and then you have Spud — the direct approach — yes dammit, do something, man!…your “mouth happiness” is at stake, so follow a schedule that keeps you puffing every waking minute…

…and we move on to the fashion world, where this new-fangled “Talon Slide Fastener” is keeping women’s corsets zipped up, except the vulgar, slang word “zipper” hasn’t quite made it into the fashion lexicon as of 1932…

…and this other new invention — “Rayon” — is “becoming important to women who watch and are watched in classic correctness,” but believe me, no old money deb would ever allow anything artificial to touch her delicate hide…

…we continue into the cartoons in the fashion mode with one of Helen Hokinson’s “girls” getting a makeover…

…Mary Petty, on the other hand, is keeping an eye on the younger crowd…

…we move on to Barbara Shermund and the old money gang, wary of astrologer Evangeline Adams‘ thoughts on the ailing stock market…

…one of their fellows was having troubles of his own in those troubled times, per William Steig…

…and Denys Wortman took us to the other side of that window, and the dreams of a better life…

…urban realist Reginald Marsh gave us all a splash of cold water…

…I. Klein, on the other hand, presented a domestic scene with particular relevance these days…

…and another domestic scene from the brilliant James Thurber, in which the pistol once again makes a timely appearance…

Next Time: Dream Cars…

Through a Glass Darkly

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)

* * *

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)

* * *

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)

* * *

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…

Next Time: The Tragic Pose…

An American Classic

Immigration over the centuries transformed New York City into a cosmopolitan metropolis, with many of those migrants drawn from America’s hinterlands. What they found in the city was not only economic opportunity, but also a place to grow artistically and intellectually.

Aug. 8, 1931 cover by **Theodore Haupt.**

Such was the case of Willa Cather, who while living in New York City would draw on her Nebraska childhood to write a succession of novels about prairie life and its people (including My Antonia and O Pioneers!) that would culminate in a 1923 Pulitzer Prize.

Louise Bogan, in 1931 a new poetry editor for the New Yorker (and a poet herself), wrote a profile of Cather for the Aug. 8 issue. An excerpt:

TWO FACES…**Hugo Gellert** rendering of **Willa Cather** for the profile; undated photo at right gives you some idea of the look Cather aimed at the affected behavior of others. (New York Times)

FORMATIVE YEARS…Clockwise, from top left, **Willa Cather** as a student at the University of Nebraska in the early 1890s; classmates at Nebraska included author and activist **Dorothy Canfield Fisher** and Alvin Johnson, later a co-founder of New York’s New School. Both Cather and Fisher took fencing lessons from **John J. Pershing**, who taught military science at Nebraska; Cather’s childhood home in Red Cloud, Neb., and the prairie that inspired much of her writing. (news.unl.edu/Wikipedia/new school.edu/literaryamerica.net)

CITY LIFE…Clockwise, from top: **S. S. McClure, Willa Cather, Ida Tarbell**, and **Will Irvin** visit in Washington Square Park, 1924; Cather in the meadow of High Mowing farm near Jaffrey, N.H., where she wrote part of *My Antonia*; on the cover of *Time*, Aug. 3, 1931; one of Cather’s New York residences at 82 Washington Place. (Indiana University/Southwick Collection, University of Nebraska/time.com/jschumacher.typepad.com)

Bogan concluded the profile with this note about Lèon Bakst, who was commissioned in 1923 to paint a portrait of Cather while she visiting Paris (image courtesy Omaha Public Library):

My dear late friend Susan Rosowski, who was a preeminent Cather scholar, wrote that Cather was “the first to give immigrants heroic stature in serious American literature.” In these times when immigration is so hotly debated, it is worth revisiting My Antonia and O Pioneers! to recall what once made America truly great.

* * *

One Arm Restaurant

If you wanted to get lunch fast and cheap in 1931 you might have stopped at one of John Thompson’s New York restaurants. According to Tom Miller (daytoninmanhattan.blogspot.com), there were no waiters in Thompson’s restaurants. “Customers purchased foods like cold corned beef, cold boiled ham, smoked boiled tongue or hot frankfurters at a counter. They then took their trays to ‘one arm’ chairs lined up along the wall. There were no tables; instead customers ate at what was similar to turn-of-the-century school desks.” E.B. White stopped in for a visit:

YOU CAN’T MISS IT…**John Thompson’s** name is emblazoned no less than four times on the front of his restaurant at No. 33 Park Row. No-frills interior featured “one-arm” chairs and a self-service coffee urn. (*Museum of the City of New York* /daytoninmanhattan.blogspot.com)

* * *

Cinematic Eyeful

The Pre-Code comedy-drama Transatlantic was light on plot but heavy on deep-focus cinematography (by James Wong Howe) that wowed New Yorker critic John Mosher in 1931…and still wows critics today.

High Seas Hijinks…The pre-code comedy-drama *Transatlantic* wowed critic John Mosher not so much for its storyline as for its style and cinematography. Clockwise, from left, **Edmund Lowe** has his hands full with Lois Moran, Greta Nissen and **Myrna Loy**. (IMDB)

NIFTY NOIR…**John Mosher** loved the avant-garde, noir-ish stylings of *Transatlantic.* This film by director **William K. Howard** and cinematographer **James Wong Howe** is still admired today. A MoMA cinema site notes that the film’s style anticipates *Citizen Kane* by ten years. (pre-code.com)

* * *

From Our Advertisers

We begin with another socialite endorsing Pond’s Cold Cream — Mrs. Potter d’Orsay Palmer nee Maria Eugenia Martinez de Hoz. She was wife No. 2 of Potter d’Orsay Palmer, son of the wealthy family of Chicago Palmer House fame…they would divorce in 1937, and the playboy Potter would marry two more times before dying of a cerebral hemorrhage in 1939 (the result of a drunken brawl). Maria Eugenia would remarry and return to her homeland of Argentina to raise a family…

…it seems Maria Eugenia didn’t limit herself to endorsing cold cream, as this next ad attests (from the May, 1934 Delineator magazine)…

…Maria Eugenia endorsed Camels because they were marketed to women back then, as were Marlboro cigarettes, the makers of which continued their silly handwriting and jingle-writing contests to promote the brand (note the examples “Miss Eileen Fitzgerald” offered of what defined a modern lifestyle)…

…the makers of Chesterfield cigarettes, on the other hand, originally marketed their product to men, but they made sure women were included in the copy beneath the image — “yes, there’s a big woman vote” …

…you may recall the subtle ways Liggett & Myers began to lure women smokers back in 1928 with this ad campaign…

…you see a lot of tobacco ads because cigarette manufacturers were one of the few industries still turning a profit during the first years of the Depression…men and women were smoking like crazy, maybe to calm their nerves over the performance of their refrigerators…

…one could always calm the nerves by taking a spin in a new Plymouth, bargain-priced at just $535…

…and we have another Arno-esque ad by Herbert Roese, touting the wonders of “New York’s Most Interesting Newspaper”…

…on to our cartoonists, we begin with this wonderful spot drawing by Barbara Shermund…

…and an illustration by Reginald Marsh of a Coney Island crowd that graced facing pages in “The Talk of the Town”…

…here’s one of four drawings Walter Schmidt contributed to the New Yorker between 1931 and 1933…

…Perry Barlow illustrated the joys of dining out with the kiddies…

…back to Barbara Shermund, who eavesdropped on her debs…

…Kemp Starrett gave us a proud moment at the county fair…

…I. Klein offered up a new twist on the term “family planning”…

…John Held Jr assessed the aesthetic value of chunky mission-style furniture…

…and Peter Arno reappeared in the cartoons with this full-page illustration of some desperate climbers…

Next Time: Asphalt Jungle…

An Unmarried Woman

When New Yorker cartoonist Peter Arno hooked up with his colleague, nightlife columnist Lois Long, it was like twisting together two sticks of dynamite.

April 18, 1930 cover by **Charles Donelan,** his only cover for the *New Yorker*. See more about the artist at the end of this post.

Married in 1927, they were the glamour couple at the New Yorker, and each played an outsized role in giving the early magazine a distinctive, cosmopolitan voice and look. Hard-drinking hell raisers, they both loved the Roaring Twenties nightlife in what seemed like an endless party. But when the party ended, so did their brief, volatile marriage.

HELLRAISERS…**Peter Arno** and **Lois Long** were the toast of the *New Yorker* office and the toast of the town with their office romance, marriage (in 1927), and much-publicized split. The hard-partying couple separated in 1930 and divorced the following year.

As the end of her marriage neared, the 29-year-old Long had become almost circumspect, and in a series of columns under the title “Doldrums,” she took a skeptical look at the world around her, the sad ways of the younger generation, and in this fifth installment, subtitled “Can’t We Be Friends?”, she probed the inequities of a society that encouraged women to be hard-working, super competent and attractive while men still did as they pleased (the question remains today: recall 2018, when Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg asked women to “Lean In”).

LIFE WITH LOIS…**Peter Arno** drew on his domestic experiences with wife Lois Long for comic inspiration. Clockwise, top left, Arno and Long with baby daughter Patricia, 1928; a wedding day wakeup call from Arno’s 1930 cartoon collection *Hullabaloo;* Nov. 18, 1929 cover and a Aug. 24, 1929 cartoon suggesting a lack of maternal instinct. By all accounts Long was a doting mother and grandmother.

In Vanity Fair, Ben Schwartz (“The Double Life of Peter Arno,” April 5, 2016) quotes Arno’s and Long’s daughter, Patricia (Pat) Arno, about her parents’ wild relationship: “There were lots of calls to (gossip columnist Walter) Winchell or some other columnist about nightclub fights…with my mother calling and saying, ‘Oh, please don’t print that about us,’ trying to keep their names out of the papers.”

Here’s another excerpt from Long’s “Doldrums,” asking about the state of Modern Men (apologies for the missing fifth line — “novels”)…

Long had not only given up on marriage — and apparently men — for the time being, but she’d also had it with the partying life. She had ended her nightlife column, “Tables for Two,” the previous year, turning her attentions to her popular fashion column, “On and Off the Avenue,” while continuing to contribute unsigned pieces to “The Talk of the Town” and occasional pieces like “Doldrums.”

Arno and Long separated in 1930, and in early 1931 Arno moved to Reno, Nevada, which granted quick divorces to anyone who took up residency for five months. According to a 2016 book written by New Yorker cartoonist Michael Maslin (Peter Arno: The Mad, Mad World of The New Yorker’s Greatest Cartoonist), Arno found more trouble in Reno when newspaper publisher Neely Vanderbilt accused him of having an affair with his wife, Mary, and threatened violence against Arno. Maslin writes that “Nearly lost in the whole Arno/Vanderbilt dust-up was the end of Arno and Long’s marriage. On June 29th, Lois was granted a Reno divorce on the grounds of intolerable cruelty.” I highly recommend Maslin’s book, filled with anecdotes drawn from a fascinating life lived in some of New York’s headiest times.

Vanderbilt would also divorce his wife in 1931. Mary Weir Logan Vanderbilt was the second of his seven wives.

AND THE BAND PLAYED ON…On the same month as his Reno divorce (June 1931), *Vanity Fair* ran this photo of Arno pretending to conduct bandleader **Fred Waring** and two of his Pennsylvanians. (CondeNast)

Arno and Long would get joint custody of Patricia, but the child would remain living with her mother. Long had this to say about the future of her “Little Persimmon”…

* * *

A Man’s World?

E.B. White wondered in his “Notes and Comment” after encountering a barroom (had to be a speakeasy) with a carpeted floor…

KEEPING IT REAL…Patrons relax at McSorley’s Old Ale House near Cooper Square, circa 1935. (Pinterest)

* * *

Long Before Social Distancing

There were many diversions around the old city, including baseball games and the circus at Madison Square Garden…some clips from the “Goings On” section…

…Reginald Marsh marked the arrival of the circus with a drawing that encircled pages 20-21…here is a detail…

and how the whole thing appeared…

* * *

The Twain Never Met

Once a star attraction with the Ziegfeld Follies, comedian Will Rogers was also finding success on radio and in the films. His latest talkie, A Connecticut Yankee, referenced Mark Twain’s 1889 novel, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, in name only, as noted by reviewer John Mosher. But then again, Rogers himself was not a Yankee, but an Okie.

MARK WHO?…Inspired by a **Mark Twain** novel, 1931’s *A Connecticut Yankee* was mostly a **Will Rogers** vehicle. Top right, Sagramor (**Mitchell Harris**) confronts the “Connecticut Yankee” Hank Martin (**Will Rogers**). Below, the queen (**Myrna Loy**) tries to make nice with Hank. (IMDB)

* * *

From Our Advertisers

If you had the time but not the means to travel to Europe (it was the Depression, after all), you might have considered a trip to “Old Québec,” just 500 miles up the road from New York City, although in those days you likely took the train, or possibly a boat, since routes between cities were still a uneven patchwork of roads…

…and you could look stylish at the station or the boat dock with these handsome Hartmann trunks…

…these spring travelers opted for a car, filled with the aroma of burning tobacco…

…spring was also time for the latest Paris fashions, and Macy’s suggested you could “put one over on Paris” by donning a garment spun from from DuPont’s miracle fiber, Rayon…

…however, those operating the finer dress shops would never consider letting any synthetic hang in their windows, or touch their skin for that matter, and proudly proclaimed the latest shipments from Paris…

…those shopping for Paris fashions might have consulted Majorie Dork to get slim in all the right places…

…on to our illustrations and cartoons, we have two by Ralph Barton, his “Hero of the Week”…

…and his “Graphic Section” take on the week’s news…

…Gardner Rea kicks off our cartoons with a look at the machine age…

…Rea’s cartoon referred to the popular vaudeville comedian Joe Cook, who was known for his demonstrations of needlessly complex machines…here he is featured in the September 1931 issue of Modern Mechanics magazine…

…Erlanger’s Theatre advertised Cook’s “Newest, Maddest Musical” in the back pages of the New Yorker…

…it’s not often you find Mahatma Gandhi as the subject of a cartoon…this one is by Bruce Bairnsfather…

…a unique form of stage fright was illustrated by John Floherty Jr…

…Jack Markow gave us a little night music…

…Leonard Dove and the possibly reluctant apple of someone’s eye…

…I would love to know more about this Rea Irvin cartoon, which seems to be a parody of a cartoon from the British Punch…

…John Reehill rendered a portentous moment at the barbershop…

…and finally, today’s cover (bottom left) by Charles Donelan caught my eye because the early New Yorker rarely noted the existence of baseball, except in the events section. Up to this point there had been just two covers featuring baseball: May 8, 1926, by Victor Bobritsky…

…and, at right, the Oct. 5, 1929 cover by Theodore Haupt...

…as for Charles Donelan (1889-1973), this would be his only New Yorker cover, but throughout his career he would illustrate for various publications, including the sports section of the Boston Traveler (this is from the March 21, 1921 edition)…

…and a comic strip featured in the Boston Globe called “Russett Appul” (this is from Oct. 11, 1929)…Donelan also performed Russett and other characters on Boston radio stations and stage shows…

Next Time: Cinema’s Underworld…

The Road to 1931

The New Yorker entered its sixth year in 1931, and despite the deepening Depression managed to stay afloat and even gain new subscribers. Perhaps more than ever folks needed that weekly dose of levity the magazine ably supplied.

**Rea Irvin** rang out the old and welcomed the new with back-to-back covers for the Dec. 27, 1930 and Jan. 3, 1931 issues. The second cover commemorated the New York Auto Salon, mentioned later in this blog entry.

That isn’t to say the magazine’s contributors donned rose-colored glasses. Rather, they commiserated with their fellow Americans:

CRANKY COUPLETS…**Ogden Nash** lent his droll verse to the nation’s economic woes. In 1931, while working as an editor at Doubleday, Nash submitted a number of poems to the *New Yorker* and spent three months working on the magazine’s editorial staff. (poeticous.com)

Over the course of 1930 many Americans, including Ogden Nash, woke to the fact that their business and political leaders were ill-suited to lift them out of the economic mess, and were likely responsible for it in the first place. At the top of the list was President Herbert Hoover, who was profiled in the New Yorker in three installments beginning with the Dec. 27 issue. This brief excerpt gives you a glimpse into a very different White House 89 years ago:

The first installment of the profile was accompanied by a Cyrus Baldridge portrait of the president (left), but the final two installments featured a less-than-flattering Abe Birnbaum rendering that first appeared in the New Yorker in the March 2, 1929 issue:

* * *

Vorse Was a Force

Social critic, labor activist and novelist Mary Heaton Vorse (1874–1966) was no fan of Herbert Hoover or wealthy business tycoons, and in the first decades of the 20th century joined with Lincoln Steffens and other muckraking journalists in advocating for social reform. Vorse, however, also had a background in fiction writing and in observational pieces like the one below (excerpts) in which she commented on the rustic old ladies she found everywhere in the city:

FOR THE CAUSE…**Mary Heaton Vorse** (left) with fellow activists preparing to leave on a relief expedition to aid striking Kentucky miners, 1932. At right, a 1925 drawing of Vorse by **Hugo Gellert.** (nysut.org/Smithsonian)

* * *

The Mystic

Before the Beatles made the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi a famed Transcendental Meditation guru in the 1960s, there was George Ivanovich Gurdjieff, a Russian/Greek/Armenian spiritual teacher of the “Fourth Way,” which promised a path to a higher state of consciousness and full human potential. Gurdjieff also enjoyed living in a French chateau and taking trips to New York to share his wisdom with eager Americans, including famed architect Frank Lloyd Wright. “The Talk of the Town” had these observations on the visiting mystic:

HE COULD SEE THINGS…**George Ivanovich Gurdjieff,** in an undated photo.

* * *

Sunny Days

Forget about financial woes or spiritual dilemmas. What are you going to wear next summer? Fashion writer Lois Long (“On and Off the Avenue”) asked the question and looked to the south for some answers:

…numerous ads peppered the Dec. 27 issue urging Manhattan’s snowbirds to dress appropriately for the warmer climes…

…and operators of “PlaneTrains” promised to get them there as quickly as possible…

…and if you were headed to Cuba you could stay at the brand new National Hotel…

…here’s what it looked like three years ago when I was in Havana…I can guarantee you the hotel service was WAY better in 1931…

…whether home or abroad, New Yorkers were celebrating the New Year by “dancing to the melodies of Old Vienna” and smoking like chimneys…

…a popular New Year’s Eve destination was the The Roosevelt Hotel, where Guy Lombardo’s orchestra helped ring in the New Year from 1929 (radio’s first nationwide New Year’s Eve broadcast) to 1959…

I stayed at the Roosevelt Hotel in late December, and found Lombardo still presiding over the bar…

…we also find New Year’s revelry in the cartoons, with Mary Petty…

…Izzy Klein…

…Otto Soglow...

…and Leonard Dove…

…and for those who stayed home, we have this scene of domestic bliss from Don Herold…

* * *

On to the Jan. 3, 1931 issue, we have Howard Brubaker (“Of All Things”) waxing sour on the state of the economy…

…so what a better way to cheer up than to look at shiny new cars, especially the ones almost no one could afford? The New Yorker paid another visit to the New York Automobile Salon at the Grand Central Palace…

…according to the article, 1931 was “a streamline year,” and leading the way was the REO motor car company, which despite its innovative ways would drop its car line altogether in 1936 — a casualty of the Depression…

FLOWING FENDERS…The 1931 REO Royale was a trendsetter, introducing streamlining designs. The Great Depression would cause REO to abandon the manufacture of automobiles in 1936. (historicvehicle.org)

…over at the Chrysler Building, which served as that corporation’s headquarters from 1930 until the mid-1950s, new cars were on display on the building’s first two floors…

CATHEDRAL OF CARS…The first two floors of the Chrysler Building served as an auto showroom during the building’s first decade. (Wikipedia/thewelcomeblog.com)

…we segue to our advertisements, many from car companies touting their displays at the New York Automobile Salon. Like REO, Marmon was noted for various innovations, including the introduction of the rear-view mirror. It also manufactured a stunning 16-cylinder automobile that was on display at the 1931 Salon. But also like REO, the Depression proved too much for Marmon, and it was defunct by 1933…

SLEEK…The 1931 Marmon Sixteen. (RM Auctions)

…another car company that would fall to the Depression was the luxury brand Pierce Arrow. Without a lower-priced car in its lineup to provide cash flow, the company ceased operation by 1938…

…by contrast, the Chrysler Corporation had several low-priced models to help it survive the lean years and enable it to produce its luxury model, the Imperial…

ANOTHER FIRST…Chrysler was also known for its innovative ways. A custom version of the Chrysler Imperial Eight included a dictaphone. (hemmings.com)

…the Hudson Motor Car Company is long gone, but in 1930 it was the third largest carmaker after Ford and Chevrolet, and instead of luxury it touted the affordability of its cars, especially its low-priced Essex line, priced $1,000 less than its predecessor from ten years earlier. The $595 Essex would be comparable to a $9,000 to $10,000 car today (by comparison, the 1931 Marmon or Imperial would set you back somewhere between $3,000 and $5,000, roughly equivalent to a $46,000 – $78,000 range today)…

…so let’s say the Depression has wiped you out and you can’t even afford an Essex…well you could try to “smoke your way back to normalcy”…

…or be like this pair, who seem content with their Chesterfields…

…of course the movies were another means of escape from the cruel world, and Paramount’s Publix Theatres promised plenty of sex to ease troubled minds…

PRE-CODE WORLD…During a brief period of the early sound era, many films used both sex and violence to attract audiences to theaters. The Publix Theatres ad above implied that these three films had plenty of sex, or “it” — clockwise, from top left, **Fredric March** ran around in his skivvies in *The Royal Family of Broadway* (1930); **Mary Brian** and **Ina Claire** portrayed acting sisters Gwen and Julie Cavendish in *The Royal Family of Broadway*; **David Manners** and **Ruth Chatterton** shared an embrace in *The Right to Love* (1930); and **Marlene Dietrich** lured a schoolmaster into a life of madness and despair in *The Blue Angel* (1929-30).

…and we close with our cartoonists…Reginald Marsh heralded the new year with this two-page spread depicting the heavens glorifying dental hygiene…

…Leonard Dove inked two cartoons featuring table talk…

…E. McNerney continued the New Yorker tradition of cartoons featuring rich old men and their gold diggers…

…Gardner Rea pondered the value of kitsch in a regal setting…

…A.S. Foster looked in on a crowd of John Does at a speakeasy…

…and Lillian Reed took us shopping with a very specific request…

Next Time: Requiem For the Flapper…

The Future Was a Silly Place

One of the most expensive movies of 1930 was a sci-fi musical comedy titled Just Imagine, a silly mash-up of great sets, terrible acting, and a vision of the future fifty years hence that was way off the mark.

Nov. 29, 1930 cover by **Victor Bobritsky.**

Not that the film ever set out to be an accurate prediction of the future. Nevertheless, it is instructive (or, at the least, amusing) to look back on “yesterday’s tomorrows” to understand the American mind in the first year of the Great Depression.

COME FLY WITH ME…Clandestine lovers LN-18 (**Maureen O’Sullivan**) and J-21 (**John Garrick**) share a romantic moment high above the streets of 1980 New York City. (scifist.net)

Just Imagine borrowed some of its look from Fritz Lang’s Metropolis (1927), a dystopian vision of the future that reflected the contentious years of Germany’s Weimar Republic. Just Imagine similarly reflected its time and place — the early years of the Depression — Hollywood responding not with gloom and doom but rather with uplifting fare — comedies, musicals, and escapist fantasies (Flash Gordon came along in 1936). The producers of Just Imagine rolled all of it into one film, and the New Yorker’s John Mosher tried to make sense of the mess:

EYE IN THE SKY…In *Just Imagine,* technology is advanced enough to have a traffic cop floating in the sky, but he still must rely on his arms and mechanical signals to keep the skyways in order. (YouTube clip)

The floating traffic cop is just one example of the film’s attention to set design. The New York skyline, featured in the opening scene, was constructed in a giant hangar at enormous cost…

In one of the films weirder twists, vaudeville comedian El Brendel is brought back to life with an electric beam…

SMOKED HAM…Vaudeville comedian **El Brendel** is zapped back to life to provide the world of 1980 with comic relief. Some of the electrical equipment assembled by set designer **Kenneth Strickfaden** would be seen again in 1931’s Frankenstein. (scifist.net)

…and Brendel (below, center), proceeds to get drunk on booze pills and spew a series of really bad jokes throughout the duration of the film…

SHOULD HAVE LEFT HIM DEAD…**Frank Albertson, El Brendel** and John Garrick in *Just Imagine.* (scifist.net)

MARS ATTACKS…The film also took audiences to the surface of Mars via a phallus-shaped spaceship that would later be used in Flash Gordon serials. Clockwise, top left, the spaceship blasts off surrounded by a crowd of men in fedoras; aboard the spaceship; landing site on Mars; J-21 (**John Garrick**) encounters the Martian Queen (**Joyzelle Joyner**). (YouTube/scifist.net)

The movie flopped at the box office, but producers were able to recoup some of the costs by farming out clips of the futuristic sets, and some of the props, to other sci-fi films of the 1930s including the Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers serials.

* * *

Toys For Tots

By mid-November the New Yorker’s “On and Off the Avenue” column had lengthened to include ideas for Christmas shoppers. The Nov. 29 issue offered these ideas for children’s toys from Macy’s…

XMAS IS COMING…Patsy Ann dolls in smart berets, and dollhouses in various styles (a 1930 Triang Tudor dollhouse at right) could be had at Macy’s Herald Square flagship store. (Pinterest)

GRRRR…First introduced in 1922, the revival of “Radio Rex” proved popular to the kiddies in 1930. It was the “high tech” toy of its day, the first to respond to voice commands. Rex the dog would spring out of his doghouse at the sound of the word “Rex,” thanks to a sound-sensitive electromagnet. (ctinventor.wordpress.com)

* * *

A Century-old-Problem

Traffic woes have been around almost as long as there have been cars. In an excerpt from “A Reporter at Large,” Morris Markey explained the challenges facing the city’s police department:

IF YOU BUILD IT, THEY WILL COME…Traffic clogs Fifth Avenue near 42nd Street in 1930. (Pinterest)

* * *

Speaking of cars, this ad in the New Yorker announced the opening of the annual Automobile Salon at the Commodore Hotel…

…and the magazine was on hand to describe its various wonders. Some excerpts:

POETRY IN MOTION…Top, the **Walter Dorwin Teague**-designed Marmon 16-cylinder wowed crowds at the Salon, even if few could afford it. The Great Depression limited the production of the luxury Marmon, and less than 400 were produced. The company abandoned the car business altogether in 1933. Below, the sporty Ford Model L Roadster, designed by Raymond Dietrich. (supercars.net/Sotheby’s)

* * *

Maestro Politician

The New Yorker profiled pianist, composer and statesman Ignacy Jan Paderewski (1860-1941). Paderewski served as Poland’s prime minister in 1919, negotiated on behalf of his country at the Treaty of Versailles, and had a 60-year career as a virtuoso pianist. A brief excerpt:

* * *

Not For the Moneychangers

Architecture critic George S. Chappell checked in on the progress of three prominent Manhattan cathedrals in his “Sky Line” column:

LANDMARKS ALL…From left, Riverside Church, the still yet-to-be completed St. John the Divine, and St. Bartholomew’s. (MCNY/masonrymagazine.com/dtjoyce.com)

* * *

The theater review section included this illustration of a new play, Roar China, that opened Oct. 27, 1930 at the Beck Theatre.

The staging of Roar China included this reconstruction of the bow of the H.M.S. Europa on the Beck Theatre stage…

* * *

From Our Advertisers

The holiday season was in the air, and retailers were taking various approaches to entice Depression-era shoppers to consider their wares. The ads have a more conservative bent, when compared to late 1920s, and in the case of Wanamaker’s and B. Altman’s, an appeal to simpler times…

…Macy’s, on the other hand, looked to sell rather expensive lighters “to arouse the youthful enthusiasm among veteran smokers”…

…despite the Depression, New Yorker subscriptions continued to steadily increase — the magazine had nearly 45,000 subscribers in 1930, and by the end of the decade the number would approach 100,000 — below, a house ad designed to entice new subscribers…

…our cartoons include this holiday spot illustration by Barbara Shermund…

…and another by Shermund of her parlor room crowd…

…Otto Soglow amused us with a couple of tots…

…Gardner Rea imagined a confrontation between a Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade balloon and Italy’s Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini…

…the balloon Rea illustrated was “The Captain” from the popular Katzenjammer Kids comic strip. Along with his “family,” the Captain appeared in the parade in 1929 and 1930 (and possibly 1931). They were the first licensed character balloons in the parade’s history…

…back to cartoons, book shopping with William Crawford Galbraith…

…and some holiday cheer from A.S. Foster…

Next Time: Ziegfeld’s Folly…

The High Place

For this installment we look at two issues, Nov. 15 and 22, both featuring covers by Theodore Haupt that celebrated two autumn rituals: football and Thanksgiving.

Let’s begin with the Nov. 22 issue, which climbed to the highest place in Manhattan — no, not the Chrysler Building, but the nearby Empire State Building — with E.B. White admiring the commanding view:

Before the Empire State Building could go up, the old Waldorf-Astoria hotel had to come down. As White observed, the old hotel was built so soundly that it was too costly to deconstruct and salvage. Most of it ended up on the bottom of the ocean.

DOWN IN DAVY JONES’ LOCKER lie the remains of the old Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, which stood for just 36 years before it was razed to make room for the Empire State Building. At right, one of the hotel’s lobbies, and the Grand Ballroom. (nyc-architecture.com/Pinterest)

UPSTART…Left, in this image from November 1930, scaffolding embraces the Empire State Building’s “mooring mast,” which promoters claimed would allow dirigibles to load and unload passengers atop the tallest building in the world. Top right, although not yet complete, the actual height of the Empire State Building exceeded the Chrysler Building by October 1930. It would officially claim the crown as the world’s tallest on May 1, 1931. Bottom right, a steelworker’s view of the Chrysler Building from atop the Empire State Building, taken by photographer **Lewis Hine.** (Fine Art America/MCNY/Wikipedia)

A LOT OF HOT AIR…Top images: The fabled “mooring mast,” described by **E.B. White** in his *New Yorker* brief, as imagined in composite images (old-time Photoshop). In reality, the morning mast never worked; bottom right, a cutaway view of the mast featured in *Popular Mechanics*; bottom left, *New York Times* photo from March 22, 1931, announcing the completion of the Empire State Building, just 17 months after the Waldorf-Astoria began coming down. (Reddit, Pinterest, NYT)

SURVEYING THEIR KINGDOM…Most visitors to the Empire State Building can only go as high as the 86th floor observation deck. However, if you are a VIP like Serena Williams or **Taylor Swift**, you can get your picture snapped on the 103rd. (Empire State Building/Evan Bindelglass, CBSNewYork)

* * *

Sore Winner

Sinclair Lewis famously declined the Pulitizer Prize for his 1925 novel Arrowsmith, upset that his 1920 novel Main Street had not previously won the prize. But when the Swedish Academy came calling with a Nobel Prize in Literature in 1930, he happily accepted. According to “The Talk of the Town,” this award also seemed a bit tardy, since Lewis’s small town booster archetype, George F. Babbitt, did not fit the dour days of the Great Depression. But it turned out that the 1922 novel Babbitt was ultimately what swayed the Nobel jury:

BOOST FROM A BOOSTER…George F. Babbitt helped make **Sinclair Lewis** famous, and landed him a Nobel. (NYT, NOVEMBER 6, 1930)

* * *

Not So Sweet

Those of a certain age might remember Helen Hayes as a sweet old lady who appeared on a number of TV shows in the 1970s and 80s, or as the mother in real life of James MacArthur, Disney teen star and later the portrayer of Danny “Book ’em Danno” Williams on the original Hawaii 5-0 TV series. Hayes was married to playwright Charles MacArthur, and “The Talk of the Town” takes it from there…

CREATIVE TYPES…The engaged couple **Charles MacArthur** and **Helen Hayes** posed for photographer Edward Steichen for this Jan. 1, 1929 image featured in Vanity Fair magazine. (Condé Nast)

* * *

Ain’t It Grand

Grand Hotel opened at the National Theatre on Nov. 13, 1930 to strong reviews, including the one below by Robert Benchley that he filed for the New Yorker. The play, adapted from the 1929 novel Menschen im Hotel by Austrian writer Vicki Baum, would prove to be a smash on Broadway and again on the silver screen in a star-studded 1932 film featuring Greta Garbo, John Barrymore, and Joan Crawford.

THE STARS ALIGN…Left, promotional photograph of the original Broadway production of *Grand Hotel.* At right, **Eugenie Leontovich** portrayed fading Russian ballerina Grusinskaya in the play. The role would go to **Greta Garbo** in the 1932 film adaptation. (Theatre Magazine, February 1931/Wikipedia)

…and while we are on the subject of Broadway, the theater review section also featured this Al Frueh illustration promoting a noted production of Twelfth Night at the Maxine Elliott…

Program for the production featuring **Jane Cowl**. (Playbill)

* * *

There were also big doings at the Met, where Spanish lyric soprano Lucrezia Bori (1887-1960) wowed audiences with her portrayal of Violetta in La Traviata.

SHE HAD SOME PIPES…right, lyric soprano **Lucrezia Bori** on the cover of the June 30, 1930 edition of Time magazine. At right, promotional photo of Bori circa 1930. (Time/Wikipedia)

* * *

Bounty of Blessings

Humorist W. E. Farbstein gave readers plenty to be thankful for in this tribute to the Thanksgiving holiday…

* * *

From Our Advertisers

Occasionally advertisements acknowledged the reality of the Great Depression, including this one from the Saturday Evening Post that offered encouraging words to prospective readers…

…County Fair, a Greenwich Village country-themed nightclub, offered the diversion of Moffatt and Bowman to take audiences’ minds off of hard times…

…and for all the supposed sophistication of New Yorker readers, there were still plenty of back page ads offering nostrums laced with superstition…

…some of the more colorful, spritely ads from the era were offered up by the producers of Texaco Motor Oil…

…our cartoons are by Gardner Rea…

…Barbara Shermund…

…William Crawford Galbraith…

…and Perry Barlow…

…and for another reminder of reality in the city, this sketch that ran along the bottom of “The Talk of the Town,” by Reginald Marsh…

…and now we step back to the Nov. 15 issue, where E.B. White offered a less somber take on the Great Depression…

…White also noted a change on the faces of storefront mannequins…

YIN AND YANG…The worldly pose of a Roaring Twenties mannequin, and a more wholesome look for the leaner times in the 1930s. (Pinterest)

* * *

Playing Telephone

Long, long before cell phones, telephones were heavy stationary devices that required a certain amount of planning before installation, as E.B. White explains:

On to our Nov. 15 ads, we have this announcement for The Third New Yorker Album…with illustration by Otto Soglow…

…here is what the album looked like…

…and a couple of inside pages…

…one of the contributors to the album was Rea Irvin, founding illustrator for the New Yorker and Murad cigarettes…also another Flit insecticide ad by Dr. Seuss…

…Christmas ads began appearing in the magazine, including this one for Hanson scales…pity the poor chap (and his wife) who actually thought this might be a suitable present for Christmas, or any occasion for that matter…