And They Get By With It (The Hairdresser)

This Sunday comic strip by E.C. Segar demonstrates the visual vocabulary that newspaper comics inherited from earlier illustrated humor: sequential panels with speech balloons, exaggerated proportions for comedic effect, and a recurring character solving a practical problem through absurd means. The six-panel layout tracks a hairdresser's escalating attempts to manage an unruly head of hair using increasingly baroque contraptions—string twists, sadhead sponges, and elaborate mechanical devices. Segar's work appeared in newspapers alongside the expanding roster of daily and Sunday strips that established comics as a distinct medium, distinct from political cartoons or single-panel gags. The strip's humor relies on readers' familiarity with beauty salon culture and contemporary mechanical gadgetry.