Salesman Sam

This Sunday strip by Swan follows Sam, a fast-talking salesman, through two connected stories. In the left panels, Sam pitches a long-distance telephone service to a skeptical customer; in the right, he attempts to sell Brooklyn Bridge stock—a classic con. The strip employs the visual conventions that defined newspaper comics: multiple panels advancing narrative action, speech balloons capturing rapid-fire dialogue, and a recurring protagonist navigating urban sales schemes. *Salesman Sam* appeared in American newspapers during the 1920s-30s, when the Sunday funnies and daily strips established the formal vocabulary of sequential art that would shape the comic book medium.