ComicBook Experience

From the exhibition

Bringing Up Father — 16 February 1925

· George McManus, syndicated daily strip, 1913–2000

Bringing Up Father — 16 February 1925
Four panels follow Jiggs stomping out of the house to punish Maggie and their daughter by leaving without breakfast or a goodbye. On the stoop he woos the daughter with operatic nonsense syllables — *woo-wow-o-o*, *fah-fah* — hoping to make her cry and apologize. She stares back blankly, a question mark floating above her head. Jiggs deflates: *Bah! What a life!* McManus's draftsmanship is assured: black checkered suit, top hat, expressive silhouette. Launched in 1913, *Bringing Up Father* was among the first daily strips to sustain a consistent cast across years of gags, helping establish the recurring-character serial as the dominant newspaper comic form — the direct ancestor of the comic book's own sequential, character-driven storytelling.

Public domain, restored and presented by comicbooks.com public-domain