Mutt and Jeff — 1908-04-11

Eight horizontal panels follow the lanky, top-hatted Mutt as fight gossip pushes him toward a desperate bet on a boxing match. Speech balloons carry rapid-fire banter; a domestic scene midstrip—a woman at a stove scolding him—pivots the gag before a final panel delivers the punchline in dense caption text. The loose ink linework and exaggerated silhouettes are characteristic of Bud Fisher's early style. Launched in the *San Francisco Chronicle* in 1907, *Mutt and Jeff* was among the first strips to use a fixed cast in a continuous daily sequence, establishing the recurring-character format that would define comic strips and, eventually, the comic book as a collected, character-driven medium.