Rudolph Dirks, Cartoonist

This portrait captures Rudolph Dirks (1877–1968), the German-born artist who in 1897 launched *The Katzenjammer Kids* for William Randolph Hearst's New York Journal — arguably the first modern comic strip. Dirks codified the visual grammar every subsequent cartoonist inherited: sequential panels of fixed size, integrated speech balloons, and recurring characters whose personalities audiences tracked week after week. His slapstick duo Hans and Fritz — anarchic immigrant boys tormenting the long-suffering Captain — trafficked in the broad ethnic caricature standard to the era, their 'Dutch' dialect played for broad laughs. After a bitter legal battle with Hearst in 1912, Dirks moved to a rival syndicate, leaving his own strip behind. The photograph shows a young man in a flat cap and suit, composed and assured.