Bringing Up Father — buf390526

George McManus's *Bringing Up Father* ran in American newspapers from 1913 until his death in 1954, making it one of the longest-lived daily strips. This four-panel sequence follows the domestic chaos of a crying infant: a harried figure endures four hours of wailing, mutters that the name "Howler" would suit the child, then a parade of fashionably dressed visitors coo over the now-sleeping baby, oblivious to the ordeal just endured. McManus's draftsmanship is immediately recognizable — thick confident outlines, decorative patterned clothing, and expressive rubber-limbed figures. His mastery of speech-balloon pacing, staggering punch lines across panels, was foundational to the visual grammar that daily newspaper strips handed directly to the first comic-book artists of the late 1930s.