July, 1931. The Great Depression is in full swing. Still over a year until the 1932 election. The New Yorker has always had a subscriber base with a richer demographic than average, but these cartoons from the 7/4/31 and 7/11/31 don’t show much awareness of the Great Depression.
Another ping-pong related cartoon. Was there a ping-pong boom in 1931?
What is that device?
It looks like we only have part of a caption here. Can you finish it?
Cartoons in The New Yorker are famously obscure. Time passing may further obscure them, but also provide a patina of remembrance. With this in mind, I present a selection from October, 1972.
How is this different from what I did for decades — stand on a train platform, waiting for the morning train to the city?
Now that we can use Google to investigate our symptoms, is this worse?
No clue.
Comics I Don't Understand 