Polly and Her Pals — October 10, 1922

Cliff Sterrett's *Polly and Her Pals* daily strip titled "Safety First,' Is Paw's Motto!" unfolds across four panels: Maw scolds hulking son Ashur for staying out until two in the morning; Paw eagerly volunteers to discipline him; a comical thrashing ensues; and Ashur — dazed, head spinning — innocently asks, *"Was I with you?"* Sterrett's draftsmanship is distinctive: fluid crosshatching, exaggerated figure weight, and expressive balloon lettering that carries dialect phonetically. Launched in 1912 by the New York Evening Telegram, *Polly* ran until 1958, making it one of American newspaper comics' longest-lived strips. These syndicated dailies and Sunday pages were the direct precursor to the comic book — their panel grids, recurring casts, and speech-balloon conventions establishing the visual grammar later collected, reprinted, and sold as the first comic books in the 1930s.