Mutt and Jeff — 1909-12-13

Bud Fisher's *Mutt and Jeff* — here a daily strip in which the lanky, scheming Mutt drags the tiny, bowler-hatted Jeff into a boxing-promotion con, bidding an absurdly precise $2,067,381 before a roomful of gentlemen promoters, only to be literally booted out the door in the final panel — was the first six-days-a-week comic strip with a fixed cast and continuous gags. Launched in the *San Francisco Chronicle* in 1907, it pioneered the horizontal multi-panel daily format, consistent character design, and integrated speech balloons that would define the form. Its syndication model, recurring duo, and punchy punchline structure became the direct template from which comic books, assembled from reprinted newspaper strips, emerged in the 1930s.