Spareribs and Gravy Grapple for Sunken Treasure

This Sunday comic strip follows two characters and a large octopus in a six-panel sequence centered on buried treasure and dinner preparations. The artist uses speech balloons, sequential panel layout, and physical comedy—the octopus's tentacles provide visual gags across frames. The strip exemplifies early newspaper comics' blend of adventure narrative and slapstick humor. By 1913, the Sunday comics page had become a standard feature in American newspapers, establishing the visual conventions—bordered panels, dialogue balloons, recurring characters—that would define the medium. These newspaper strips were the direct precursors to the comic books that emerged in the 1930s, with artists developing the grammar of sequential art that remains fundamental to comics today.