Old Doc Yak and Young De Palma

Sidney Smith's *Old Doc Yak* follows a cantankerous goat and his young companion through rural mishaps, here involving a runaway jalopy and a near-fatal plunge. Smith's panel layout and speech balloons guide readers through six tiers of escalating chaos, building comic tension through sequence and visual gags. The strip exemplifies early newspaper comics' reliance on slapstick and vehicle humor—popular fodder for the Sunday funnies that preceded comic books. Smith's clear line work and staging made *Old Doc Yak* a staple of the 1910s funny papers, establishing conventions of character-driven comedy strips that would define the medium.