Our Dumb Century
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Our Dumb Century is a satirical humor book written by the staff of The Onion and published by Three Rivers Press in 1999. The chief editor was Robert Siegel (not the radio journalist of the same name), with specific sections edited by Maria Schneider, John Krewson and Siegel.
The book, spun off from The Onion's weekly-newspaper format of dryly satirizing current events, features mocked-up newspaper front pages from the entire 20th century, presented as though The Onion had been continuously in print since before 1900. The publication of the book is in itself a parody of other end of the century retrospectives that had been published in 1999, notably TIME magazine and the New York Times.
Twentieth century events satirized in the book include the sinking of the Titanic, heralded with the banner headline "WORLD'S LARGEST METAPHOR HITS ICE-BERG;" the start of World War II, announced on the page with a massive "WA-" and the announcement "Headline continued on page 2;" and the Apollo 11 Moon landing, given the incredulous headline "HOLY SHIT-- MAN WALKS ON FUCKING MOON." World War I headline reads "WAR DECLARED BY ALL; AUSTRIA DECLARES WAR ON SERBIA DECLARES WAR ON GERMANY DECLARES WAR ON FRANCE DECLARES WAR ON TURKEY DECLARES WAR ON RUSSIA DECLARES WAR ON BULGARIA DECLARES WAR ON BRITAIN; OTTOMAN EMPIRE ALMOST DECLARES WAR ON ITSELF. NATIONS STRUGGLE TO REMEMBER ALLIES". Smaller stories in the book satirize social and pop-cultural trends of their respective eras. Faux-advertisements and gimmicks abound in the top and bottom corners of the pages. For example, from the 1920s: No, No, Nanette Fever Bonus! Sheet Music from "Tea for Two" Inside.
Not all the articles are so literal. In 1923, for example, we read: "Russians continuing to kill Rasputin", complete with a list of methods tried so far by the 'Kill Rasputin Project'.
1964's entry informs us that: "Warren Commission admits to killing JFK".
Perhaps most fanciful of all is a sequence of articles parodying Watergate, in which Richard Nixon is arrested in the Oval Office for his crimes. The next entry has Nixon killing and injuring several guards during a prison escape (with Spiro Agnew as getaway driver). The final instalment is 'Nixon shot dead outside Arizona motel', after taking a pregnant woman hostage while attempting to cross the border.
Since the book was written before the year 2000, its prediction for that year satirized Y2K and religious prophecies, including "Christian Right Ascends to Heaven," "All Corporations Merged Into OmniCorp," and a small graphic listing meteors headed for Earth by size.
There are a number of running gags through this supposed history of the twentieth century, which are not immediately apparent. One is the existence of a piece of farmyard equipment called 'The Chicken Raper'. Another is that every major celebrity trial, from Fatty Arbuckle to O.J. Simpson, is referred to as 'the trial of the century'. A third is the newspaper fear-mongering by drawing a caricature of America's enemy du jour (among them, Spaniards, Nazis and hippies) assaulting an anthropomorphized Statue of Liberty. A more subtle satire is the rise of a (fictional) company called 'Global Tetrahedron', which first appears as a small business in the first decade of the century and gradually grows into a multinational behemoth. Several events from the classic film It's a Wonderful Life are also used as stories, such as "Mr. Potter To Pay Fifty Cents on the Dollar" during the Great Depression and "Harry Bailey Wins Congressional Medal of Honor" in the World War II section, with Harry S Truman quoted in the latter story as saying "we owe a great debt to George Bailey for pulling Harry out of the ice when he was 9" and saying George was declared 4-F because of his ear. Also present is the frequent theme of moral outrage at the amount of sex in popular culture, beginning with a depiction of women's undergarments reproduced from a Sear's catalogue.
The book became a number one New York Times best-seller shortly after its publication, appropriately on April 1, 1999.
An audio version of the book was produced, presented as excerpts from the nationally syndicated The Onion Radio News throughout the same time period and covering many of the same subjects.
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