ComicBook Experience

From the exhibition

Spareribs and Gravy Take Command of the Wise-Nuff Ferry

· May 5, 1912

Spareribs and Gravy Take Command of the Wise-Nuff Ferry
George McManus's Sunday strip follows two characters navigating mishaps aboard a ferry, their exaggerated physical comedy unfolding across eight panels. The visual narrative—sequential panels with speech balloons, sight gags escalating toward climax—exemplifies early newspaper comic conventions. McManus employs heavy ink work and expressive caricature typical of 1912. This Sunday page appeared in the San Francisco Call's comic section, part of the newspaper comics boom that established recurring characters and visual storytelling language—direct ancestors of the comic book form.

Public domain, restored and presented by comicbooks.com public-domain