The Top o' the Mornin'

W. D. Nesbit's *The Top o' the Mornin'* exemplifies the Sunday newspaper comic format at the turn of the century. Multiple self-contained gags—including "Gallant?," "A Quandary," "Look at His Head," and "Taken at Her Word"—fill the page with pen-and-ink drawings that rely on exaggerated facial expressions and period costume for their humor. Speech balloons carry dialogue and internal monologue; small panel sequences advance individual jokes. By 1905, this layout had become standard in American Sunday papers, establishing the visual vocabulary—recurring characters, bordered panels, integrated text and image—that would define comic strip and eventually comic book storytelling for decades to come.