Polly and Her Pals — Daily Strip

Four panels follow an older man—likely Polly's father Paw Perkins—who visits Professor Van Duzen for a graceful-living exercise regimen. Coached to balance on one toe, head back, and swing in circles while counting to fifteen, he ends the strip in a dizzy heap beside a mirror. Sterrett's linework is lively and rubbery, the figure exaggeration perfectly timed to the physical gag. *Polly and Her Pals* launched in 1912 as one of the earliest strips to center a young woman character, though Paw quickly stole the spotlight. Sterrett went on to develop increasingly abstract, Cubist-inflected backgrounds through the late 1920s—making this strip a notable bridge between the broad slapstick of early newspaper comics and the visual sophistication that would follow.