The h2g2 Literary Corner: What Made Teenagers Laugh in 1930
Created | Updated Sep 18, 2016
Sometimes our elders embarrass us. They even do it in print.
What Made Teenagers Laugh in 1930
The following joke-and-advert page was towards the back of the 1930 Yearbook for Galileo High School, titled the Telescope, get it? We gather the school was somewhere in the vicinity of San Francisco, California, USA. For those not familiar with 'yearbooks', the rest of the volume is full of pictures of the faculty and students of the school, with drawings, cutesiness, and comments by the students of the Yearbook staff. It's an annual keepsake sort of thing, and useful for trips down memory lane and searches for embarrassing photos by historians and celebrity hunters.
Yearbooks give us a glimpse into what average teenagers were wearing back in the day, what they were thinking about, and what their aspirations were. The adverts are revelatory, as well: one local sponsor suggested the 'next big event' in these young peoples' lives might require a wedding ring, which the jeweler sold. Another well-wishing firm invited students (presumably the female ones) to prepare for the future by taking a secretarial course1. We can also tell what they admired: an advert for a kind of knitted jacket called 'The Snugger' touted its military fit and promised the guys they would be 'trim as a West Pointer' (military cadet). The fact that this was a selling point says a lot.
So do these jokes. Read 'em and feel smug. Grandpa and Grandma might have guffawed at these, but we're wondering how they survived on this kiddie humour. Oh, and the first joke? Making a similar one on Youtube got a college student kicked out of a California university a few years back. At least some things have improved, besides the hairstyles.
