Bringing Up Father — buf390428

Four dailies follow the classic McManus domestic triangle: an elegantly dressed woman excitedly shows her visitor a photograph of "Sonny's baby," then rushes to share it with Jiggs, only for the punchline to land on Jiggs himself — horrified that the infant is his spitting image, imagining his own parents' suffering. McManus's linework is unmistakable: art-nouveau flourishes on the women's gowns, bold spot blacks, and speech balloons whose lettering carries comic timing as surely as the faces do. *Bringing Up Father*, syndicated from 1913, reached over 750 papers worldwide and helped codify the recurring-cast daily strip — the very format that King Features and its rivals would soon repackage as the first comic books, making strips like this one the direct ancestors of the medium.