Bringing Up Father — buf411019f

George McManus launched *Bringing Up Father* in 1913, and by 1941 it was running in hundreds of papers worldwide — a Sunday page whose visual polish helped standardize the language of American comics. This strip follows Jiggs, the nouveau-riche Irishman in top hat and white spats, as he attempts the Kafkaesque task of paying his gas-and-electric bill in person. Each panel sends him to a new floor or office; clerks redirect him upward, downward, sideways, and finally to a room that writes checks rather than accepts cash. He returns home to Maggie to discover the utility company simply shut off his lights. McManus's draftsmanship — Art Nouveau curves, elegantly dressed figures, ornate furniture — gives slapstick domestic comedy an unlikely architectural grandeur.