Mutt and Jeff — 1908-09-28

Mutt and Jeff by Harry Conway "Bud" Fisher is among the earliest American comic strips to feature a fixed cast of recurring characters in daily continuity. This strip — headlined *Jeff's Appetite Gets Him in Jail* — runs across two tiers of panels following the tall, scheming Mutt and his short, dim companion Jeff through a restaurant con that ends with both behind bars. The gag hinges on Jeff ordering extravagantly after pretending he has already eaten. Fisher's clean brushwork, expressive gesture, and brisk pacing show the strip form already mature: sequential panels, integrated speech balloons, and a reliable comedic duo readers could follow day to day. A *Kids' Corner* panel with a dark Jack-and-Jill joke fills the final column. First appearing in the *San Francisco Chronicle* in 1907, Mutt and Jeff ran for decades and was central to establishing the daily newspaper strip as a popular narrative medium.