Tarzan (comic strip)

By a striking coincidence, the Tarzan comic strip debuted on January 7, 1929 — the very same day as Buck Rogers — splitting the birth of adventure comics between science fiction and the jungle. Adapting Edgar Rice Burroughs's hugely popular novels, the strip was drawn by Hal Foster, and it changed what comics could look like.

Where most strips relied on the loose, economical line of the gag cartoon, Foster brought the disciplined draftsmanship of magazine and advertising illustration. His Tarzan moved with anatomical realism through richly rendered jungles, proving that a newspaper strip could aspire to the standards of serious adventure illustration. This elevation of the art form had enormous influence; Foster would go on to create the celebrated Prince Valiant in the 1930s, and a generation of adventure-strip and comic-book artists studied his example.

Tarzan carried the pulp hero — physically magnificent, at home in a wild and dangerous world — into the comics, a template the costumed heroes would later follow. As a 1929 work, the earliest Tarzan strips entered the U.S. public domain in 2025.