From the exhibition
Now, What D'ye Think of That?
· March 26, 1906

This four-panel Sunday comic demonstrates the visual conventions that defined early newspaper strip storytelling. A man in checked suit demonstrates an axiom—"I never do things by halves"—through escalating action across the panels. Each panel advances the narrative with clear sequential logic: statement, physical comedy, domestic reaction, and punchline. Speech balloons anchor dialogue while visual gags carry the humor forward. The strip's bold black-and-white line work and dense cross-hatching reflect the printing techniques of the era. By the early 1900s, such daily and Sunday strips in newspapers became the proving ground for the visual grammar—panels, balloons, recurring characters—that would establish the foundations of the modern comic book medium.
Public domain, restored and presented by comicbooks.com public-domain