Buster Brown

R. F. Outcault's *Buster Brown* ran in the New York Herald beginning in 1902, and this Sunday page shows the strip's signature nine-panel grid in full operation. The story follows mischievous Buster, his dog Tige, and friend Sissy Blabby through a visit that ends with Sissy's terrier biting a doll and being declared rabid — the gag escalating panel by panel through chases, screams, and a deadpan final punchline. Outcault had already invented the modern comics page with *The Yellow Kid* in 1895, establishing speech balloons and recurring characters as storytelling tools. *Buster Brown* refined those conventions: consistent character design, cinematic panel sequencing, and captions that counterpoint rather than merely describe the action — the direct grammar from which the comic book form descends.