Bringing Up Father — buf400111

Four panels follow Jiggs and Maggie in a domestic crisis: racing to catch a Washington train, Maggie pauses to telephone Mrs. Etta Carrot-Soup about their Philadelphia stay, misses the departure, then learns at the ticket window the next train leaves tomorrow. George McManus draws in his characteristic Art Deco shorthand — bold outlines, spotted blacks, Maggie's imperious hat, Jiggs's ever-present top hat and checkered suit. McManus launched *Bringing Up Father* in 1913, and its gag structure — repeated domestic friction, punchline in the final panel — helped standardize the strip format that comic-book editors would soon repackage as anthology pages, making newspaper comics the direct ancestor of the comic book as a medium.