Mutt and Jeff — 1908-09-26

Six panels follow the lanky, plaid-suited Mutt through a New York doctor's visit. Seated on a bench in panel one, he frets that his horse was scratched and his nerves are shot; he resolves to see a doctor. The rotund physician examines his tongue, lungs, pulse, and heart in succession, delivering a cascade of grim verdicts — 'you're dead,' 'strictly no exercise,' 'don't even breathe' — until Mutt throws up his hands with 'Aw, good night!' The strip closes with him putting eleven dollars on a horse named Moquette. Bud Fisher launched *A. Mutt* in the *San Francisco Chronicle* in 1907, making it the first successful daily newspaper comic strip with a recurring cast — the direct ancestor of the comic book format that would crystallize three decades later.