Bringing Up Father — 1925-06-25

Four panels track Jiggs's comic evasion: his wife laments the loss of a 'fine cat,' Jiggs—who apparently disposed of it—cuts her off with escalating bluster, vowing to run anyone out of town who mentions cats. Settled into an armchair, he's interrupted by a servant announcing 'Mr. Katz to see you.' The final panel finds Jiggs flat on the floor, feigning incapacity: 'When you are strong enough to git up, tell him I'm out.' McManus's draftsmanship—fluid brushwork, expressive silhouettes, architectural staging—exemplifies the daily newspaper strip at its peak. *Bringing Up Father*, syndicated from 1913, reached tens of millions of readers and was among the recurring-character strips whose accumulated visual conventions—speech balloons, sequential panels, comic timing across gutters—directly shaped the format that became the comic book.