Bringing Up Father

Four-panel daily strip by George McManus. Jiggs, the stout Irish-immigrant-made-good, sits reading when a neighbor asks Mr. Hoof to coax him into dance lessons; Jiggs stalls, then seizes a large vase and smashes it over the would-be instructor's head. Final panel: Jiggs lies bandaged in bed while his wife Maggie accepts compliments on her husband's quick temper. McManus's clean line, exaggerated silhouettes, and Art Nouveau interior details are instantly recognizable. *Bringing Up Father*, syndicated from 1913, ran for decades and was among the strips whose recurring characters, sequential panels, and speech balloons formed the direct template—reprinted in collected pamphlets—for what the industry would formalize as the comic book.