The Literary Digest

Articles from The Literary Digest

The 1922 U.S. Elections: Some Wins But Mostly Defeats (The Literary Digest, 1922)

As 1922 came to a close, it seemed that some of the Suffragettes of the old-school had not lost their taste for violence, as the reader will discover in the opening paragraph of this one page article that primarily focused on the defeat of all but one of the women candidates who ran for Federal offices in the 1922 elections. Thirty-three women running for Congressional and legislative seats in New York State went down to defeat and there were no women elected or re-elected from any state for Congress that year. However, the state of Ohio elected it’s first woman to that state’s Supreme Court: Florence E. Allen (1884–1965).

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Clemenceau and the Treaty Violations (The Literary Digest, 1922)

Georges Clemenceau (1841-1929) served as one of France’s wartime Premieres (1917-1920). The following is an excerpt from his letter to the American people imploring them to share in his outrage concerning Germany’s open contempt for their obligations agreed to under the Versailles Treaty. Clemenceau would die seven years later, fully convinced that another devastating war with Germany was just around the corner.


Click here if you would like to read about the 1936 Versailles Treaty violations.

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Japan’s China Poicy (Literary Digest, 1935)

What was called a Japanese ‘Monroe Doctrine for Asia’ whereby Japan would wield dominance there, especially in Chinese affairs, was announced last April, and drew the immediate attention of the world’s press.

In the last days of this January a following-up of this intention was seen in a series of talks at Nanking between Chiang Kai-shek, President and Generalissimo of the Nationalist Government of China, and Lieutenant-General Soshiyuki Suzuki, Japanese military representative at Shanghai; and among Akira Ariyoshi, Japanese Minister to China, and General Chiang and Premiere Wang Ching-wei.

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Jerome K. Jerome on Books (Literary Digest, 1906)

Jerome K. Jerome (1859 – 1927) was a British author and playwright from one of the sillier tribes who is best remembered for his humorous travelogue Three Men in a Boat (1889). In the attached interview, the humorist laments that the novels in his day (as opposed to our own) so seldom inspire any real use of the mind:

Books have become the modern narcotic. China has adopted the opium habit for want of fiction. When China obtains each week her ‘Greatest Novel Of The Century’, her ‘Most Thrilling Story Of The Year’, her ‘Best Selling Book Of The Season’ the opium den will be no more needed.


From Amazon: Three Men in a Boatstyle=border:none

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Military Buildup in the USSR (Literary Digest, 1935)

Premier Vyacheslav M. Molotov (1890 – 1986) pictured the Soviet Union as a lusty young giant strong enough to defend itself from both the East and the West in the keynote speech of the Seventh All Union Congress of Soviets, the Soviet Parliament.

In proof of this claim it was shown that in the last two years the Soviet Government had increased the strength of the Red Army from 562,000 men in 1932 to 940,000 in 1934.


Read about all the various international treaties that the Soviet Union violated…

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A Census of Skyscrapers (Literary Digest, 1929)

Egged on by the 1929 completion of the Chrysler building, the curious souls who ran the New York offices of THE LITERARY DIGEST were moved to learn more about skyscrapers, both in New York as well as other parts of the U.S. and We were surprised to learn that as of 1929

50 percent of the buildings in New York from 10 to 20 stories and 60 percent of those over 20 stories are located between 14th and 59th streets.


This article also presents statistical data concerning the number of tall buildings that could be found throughout the 1920s United States.

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An Interview with Suzanne Lenglen (Literary Digest, 1921)

A magazine interview highlighting the tennis career of Suzanne Lenglenstyle=border:none (1899 – 1938) up to the summer of 1921.

Mille. Lenglen was a remarkable French tennis player who won 31 Grand Slam titles from 1914 through 1926. She is remembered as the the first high-profile European woman tennis star to go professional: in 1912 she was paid $50,000.00 to play a series of matches against Mary K. Browne (1891 – 1971). This article concentrates on her supreme confidence and overwhelming determination to win.

When prest as to whether she liked a tonic, or say just a
little wine, before her matches, Mile. Lenglen admitted that she
did and that she had been promised that it would be obtained
for her in the United States. Despite the fact that she is in an
arid land Suzanne praised the effect of this stimulant on her
game.

‘Nothing, she said, is so fine for the nerve, for the strength
for the morale. A little wine tones up the system just right.
One can not always be serious. There must be some sparkle, too.’

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Poets in Their Glory: Dead (Literary Digest, 1917)

This 1917 article listed the known body count of dead poets who were rotting away in no-man’s land. A number of the scribes are unknown in our era; among the prominent names are Alan Seeger, Julian Grenfel and Rupert Brooke.


Printed in a popular U.S. magazine, it appeared on the newsstands the same week that Wilfred Owen, the most well known of World War I poets, was discharged from Craiglockhart Hospital, where he first resolved to write poetry about his experiences in the war.

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Sniper Scopes Compared (Literary Digest, 1916)

By enlarge, this article is a mildly technical piece that compares the German sniper scopes used during W.W. I to those of the British; happily, the amusing part of this essay is contained in the opening paragraph in which a British Tommy returning from the front, is quoted as exclaiming:

German snipers are better shots than the English because their rifles have telescopic sights that are illuminated at night.

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