Mutt and Jeff — 1909-12-08

Bud Fisher's *Mutt and Jeff* was the first successful daily comic strip, launched in the *San Francisco Chronicle* in 1907. This strip follows the tall, scheming Mutt as he shepherds his shorter brother Ima through New York's café society — Rector's, Martin's, the Waldorf — only for Ima to tip hat-check boys at every stop until his money runs out. Fisher's six-panel layout moves with crisp economy: speech balloons carry the gag entirely, repeated 'Thank you!' beats building to a deadpan punchline. The recurring characters, consistent visual rhythm, and daily publication schedule made strips like this the direct ancestor of the comic book format — packaged reprints of newspaper pages became the first comic books sold commercially in the 1930s.