📜 ABOUT THIS PIECE OF HISTORY 📜This is Life Magazine, Volume XXV, Number 652, New York, June 27, 1895 — ten cents a copy, and one of the great forgotten pleasures of American publishing history.Not the Life that ran iconic photographs of the 20th century. This is the original Life — the witty, beautifully illustrated weekly humor and satire magazine founded in 1883 that defined American genteel humor for a generation. Think of it as the New Yorker of the Gilded Age: pointed cartoons, dry wit, social satire, poetry, fiction, and illustrations by some of the finest pen-and-ink artists working in America. It covered society, politics, literature, and sport — with a raised eyebrow and an elegant line.This issue, dated June 27, 1895, arrives in the high summer of the Gilded Age — the America of Vanderbilts and Astors, of bicycle crazes and intercollegiate athletics, of Pabst and Ivory Soap and Burlington Route trains to Denver. It is a complete world, ten cents at a time, and it is extraordinary.---🎨 THE COVER — A FRIENDS ADVICE 🎨The cover illustration by the artist RAB depicts three men in formal evening wear — top hats, white ties, the full Victorian kit — engaged in a pointed exchange. The caption reads: The Tenor: Its very hard to keep the wolf from the door. Why dont you try singing to it? This is Lifes signature mode — the elegant setup, the deflating punchline, the illustration that makes you look twice. It is as sharp now as it was in 1895.---🚣 THE INTERCOLLEGIATE STRUGGLE OF THE FUTURE — YALE VS HARVARD 🚣The centerpiece illustration of this issue is a stunning full-page artwork titled The Intercollegiate Struggle of the Future — a Yale versus Harvard crew race satire rendered in beautiful pen-and-ink. The Yale-Harvard rivalry was one of the great sporting and cultural fixtures of Gilded Age America, and Life took gleeful aim at it. The illustration is visually spectacular — the kind of piece that framed beautifully on the wall of a study or library in 1895, and would do the same today.---🎪 THE POLITICAL CARTOON — THE PEACE GAME 🎪The interior carries a dense, swirling political cartoon — The Peace Game — populated with caricatures of the eras political figures in a whirlwind of action. Lifes political cartoons were among the sharpest visual commentary of the period, doing in pictures what Mark Twain was doing in prose: puncturing the pretensions of Gilded Age power with wit and precision.---🍺 THE ADVERTISEMENTS — A GILDED AGE TIME CAPSULE 🍺The advertisements in this issue are a complete window into American consumer life in 1895. Visible brands and products include Pabst Malt Extract — Supreme Award, Worlds Fair · Anheuser-Busch Celebrated Brands of Bottled Beer · Ivory Soap — Williams Shaving Stick · Hires Root Beer — Stands Alone · Bromo-Seltzer for Headache or Sick Stomach · Cuticura Soap — Supreme of Beauty · Pears Soap · Haviland China — H&C France · Buffalo Lithia Water · Adams Pepsin Tutti-Frutti · Whiting MFG Silversmiths — Solid Silver · Burlington Route to Denver — Four Trains Daily · Golden Age Champagne · Lifes Monthly Calendar for July containing The Trilby Examination.These are not just ads. They are primary-source documents of what Americans were buying, drinking, wearing, and aspiring to in the summer of 1895. Several of these brands are still household names. Others are beautifully, evocatively lost.---✍️ THE CONTENT — WIT AND ILLUSTRATION ✍️Inside pages carry a full range of Lifes signature departments and features including The Wonders of America · A Man With a Future · By Easy Stages · The Bachelors Dilemma · Some Mortals and G.W.S. (a satire on correspondence) · Our Fresh Air Fund · The Muse · Our Foolish Contemporaries — all rendered in the dry, precise, knowing voice that made Life one of the most beloved magazines in America.---📰 THE MAGAZINE ITSELF 📰Publication: Life Magazine (the original, pre-1936 humor weekly)
Date: June 27, 1895
Volume / Issue: Vol. XXV, No. 652
Price: Ten Cents
Publisher: Mitchell & Miller, 19 West 31st Street, New York
Key Features: Cover illustration A Friends Advice by RAB · Full-page Yale vs Harvard crew satire · The Peace Game political cartoon · Full editorial content · Extensive period advertisements
Format: Complete issue, ten pages photographed---🔍 TRANSPARENCY 🔍Authenticity: Guaranteed original printing from June 27, 1895 — not a facsimile or reproduction.I have photographed every page of this issue. Please review all images carefully and feel free to ask for additional close-ups of any section before purchasing.---📦 SHIPPING & PRESERVATION 📦Housed in an acid-free archival folder to protect the 130-year-old paper
Flat-shipped with heavy-duty reinforcement to ensure safe arrival
Fully tracked for your peace of mind---Ten cents. The Gilded Age. Yale against Harvard on the river, and Pabst in the glass.---🏷️ TAGS1895 Life Magazine Original, Gilded Age Magazine 1895, Victorian Humor Magazine, Yale Harvard Satire 1895, Original Life Magazine, Antique American Magazine, Gilded Age Advertising, Victorian Political Cartoon, Pabst Malt Extract Ad 1895, Ivory Soap Advertisement 1895, Hires Root Beer 1895, Victorian Illustration Magazine, Antique New York Magazine, Gilded Age Ephemera, Victorian Satirical Press
Related Items:
Life - May 23, 1895
$16.00
1895 Life Magazine — Yale vs Harvard Satire & Gilded Age America June 27
$55.55
1895 LIFE Magazine — Appian Way Centerfold, Aladdin Drama, Street Scene — Apr 18
$55.55
