Makin' B'lieve

A six-panel Sunday strip by Dwiggins featuring a group of children role-playing as royalty. The narrative follows their imaginative game: a child-king crowns himself, his courtiers follow suit, and escalating slapstick comedy ensues as the children sword-fight and enact court drama. The strip demonstrates the visual language now standard in newspaper comics—distinct panel borders, speech balloons, and sequential action moving left to right. Published during the medium's formative years, when Sunday comics pages became primary entertainment in American newspapers, the strip exemplifies how cartoonists of this era used recurring child characters and episodic gags to build loyal readership. Dwiggins's loose, gestural linework and dynamic composition reflect the graphic innovations that newspaper comics pioneer artists were developing into a distinctive art form.