Katzenjammer Kids — 1902-09-07

How the Katzenjammer Kids Got Left unfolds across six panels: the hulking sailor Uncle Heinie boasts he can carry both boys at once, hoists them on his shoulders, and crashes through a door — only to be ambushed by the boys' mother, who beats him soundly with a stick. Rudolph Dirks launched *The Katzenjammer Kids* in 1897 for Hearst's *New York Journal*, directly adapting Wilhelm Busch's German picture-story *Max und Moritz*. Dirks systematized what would become the comic strip's core vocabulary — sequenced rectangular panels, integrated speech balloons, and a cast of recurring characters whose personalities drive each gag. These Sunday pages, syndicated to millions, were the direct ancestor of the comic book format that would codify in the 1930s.