Buster Brown — 1903-10-25

Ten panels track young Buster's disastrous maiden ride on a new bicycle, his bulldog Tige trotting alongside as loyal accomplice and conscience. A well-dressed woman presents the gift; Buster tears downhill at speed, scattering livestock and launching himself airborne into a spectacular crash; the final panel has him returning home battered, declaring 'Ma, you got cheated in that bicycle.' Outcault, who had already invented Yellow Kid, gave Buster a formal resolved-speech box — an early standardized device for character voice. These color Sunday pages, syndicated nationally, established the recurring-character strip as commercial and narrative form, directly seeding the reprint pamphlets of the 1930s that became comic books. Outcault's draftsmanship is precise and kinetic, the panel gutters invisible as staging tools.