Bringing Up Father — 1917-08-17

Four panels track a running gag between Jiggs, the newly-rich Irish immigrant lounging in slippers, and his friend, who produces a meerschaum pipe. Jiggs mistakes it for a gas stove; on learning it is a genuine meerschaum he feigns sophisticated amazement; hearing it was first made two centuries ago he asks the only question that matters — 'Is it colored yet?' McManus's draftsmanship is elegant: long-legged figures in evening dress, spare furniture, clean brushwork. Bringing Up Father launched in 1913 and ran until 2000, syndicated globally — one of the longest-lived strips in the medium's history. Daily newspaper strips like this one, cut, bundled and reprinted cheaply in the 1930s, became the first comic books, carrying with them the panel grid and speech balloon grammar McManus and his generation had already perfected.