Polly Sleepyhead

This Sunday newspaper strip follows Polly through a series of escalating mishaps involving a cannon on a cart. A friend attempts to wake her by firing the extinguisher, leading to slapstick consequences: Polly lands in the cart, a flame ignites the cannon, and chaos erupts across six panels. The strip exemplifies early comic narrative—recurring character, sequential panels advancing a gag, dialogue balloons clarifying action—visual techniques newspapers were codifying as the language of comics. By 1907, the Sunday funnies had become essential to newspaper circulation, establishing the format and visual grammar that would define the medium for decades.