The Judge satirizes women, Queer culture, labor, bad drivers

One hundred years ago today … the May 22, 1920 issue of The Judge (sometimes called Judge) was replete with the magazine’s usual collage of comic fiction, poems, cartoons, and commentary, plus jokes culled from around the country. (See the entire issue here.)

Cover of The Judge, 22 May, 1920. This and all images below courtesy the Hathitrust Digital Library and the University of Michigan Library. — Cover of *The Judge,* 22 May, 1920. This and all images below courtesy the Hathitrust Digital Library and the University of Michigan Library.

The Judge was subtitled “The Happy Medium,” perhaps as a way of claiming independence from any political position. It was founded in 1881 by artists breaking away from Puck, which is probably better remembered. The Judge overtook its precursor in sales in the early twentieth century.

By 1920, Puck was gone and The Judge was thriving out of its offices at 225 5th Avenue in Manhattan, published by the Leslie-Judge Company.

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The Judge could be reactionary in its satire. Its May 22 title page features Walter De Maris’ cartoon finding humor in the idea of women’s rights intersecting with New York’s gay/queer (terms not in use at the time) culture. Below, a picture of men wearing women’s shoes, asks “In women’s struggle for equal rights with man, what provision has she made for such as these?”

A few pages later, C.W. Kables’s “The Usual Spring Crop of Green Drivers,” takes on a less controversial target, lampooning the inexperience of motorists by cramming multiple crashes and traffic violations into one panel.

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The magazine’s editorial page takes aim at labor, cautioning against letting wages get too high.

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It also critiques the Overalls Movement—which we depict in our posts of April 24 and April 26—or, in its words, the “wear-your-old-clothes movement.”

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The advertisers in The Judge included the Puritan Publishing company, hawking Sexology (1904) by William H. Walling, and the Pandiculator Company, founders of the science of pandiculation.

The Judge lasted until 1947. The weekly has been seen as a precursor to The New Yorker. Harold Ross edited The Judge in 1924 and used the experience to help him launch The New Yorker a year later.

Source/further reading: “The Judge Magazine Illustration Collection. Delaware Art Museum.

WRITTEN BY JONATHAN GOLDMAN, MAY 22, 2020.

TAGS: magazine, print culture, women’s rights, lgbtq, labor, overalls parade, cartoons, satire, humor