From the exhibition
Betty
· December 28, 1919

This Sunday newspaper strip follows Betty through domestic mishaps and social encounters, rendered in the economical line work typical of early comic page illustration. The narrative unfolds across nine panels, using speech balloons and sequential framing to guide readers through Betty's attempts to solve a plumbing crisis and manage household help. The strip exemplifies the newspaper comic format that emerged in the 1910s: a recurring character navigating middle-class life through visual gags and verbal humor. The panel-based layout, close observation of gesture, and integration of text with image reflect the visual vocabulary that newspaper comics established as foundational to the medium—techniques that would shape comic book storytelling for decades to come.
Public domain, restored and presented by comicbooks.com public-domain