From the exhibition
Bringing Up Father — buf401102
· ca. November 2, 1940 (King Features Syndicate)

George McManus launched *Bringing Up Father* in 1913, making it one of the longest-running and most widely syndicated strips in newspaper history. This daily strip follows the familiar domestic comedy of Jiggs, a nouveau-riche Irish-American, navigating the social ambitions of his wife Maggie. In four compact panels, Jiggs attempts a quiet early exit; his daughter and wife fuss over his coat and cane with cheerful suspicion; then, distracted by a street sign urging early Christmas shopping, he has a sudden eureka moment. McManus's draftsmanship is distinctive — Art Nouveau flourishes in the women's gowns, bold ink outlines, and expressive faces. The strip exemplifies how newspaper dailies codified the visual language — sequential panels, integrated speech balloons, recurring cast — that directly seeded the comic-book format emerging in the same decade.
Public domain, restored and presented by comicbooks.com public-domain