{"id":34729,"date":"2026-01-13T09:00:18","date_gmt":"2026-01-13T09:00:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/?p=34729"},"modified":"2026-01-12T17:30:14","modified_gmt":"2026-01-12T17:30:14","slug":"buster-brown-early-strips-in-full-color-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/2026\/01\/13\/buster-brown-early-strips-in-full-color-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Buster Brown: Early Strips in Full Color"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nBy\u00a0Richard F. Outcault<\/strong> with an introduction by August Derleth<\/strong> (Dover Publications)
\nISBN: 978- 0-1-486-23006-1 (Album PB)<\/p>\n

This book includes Discriminatory Content<\/strong> produced in less enlightened times.<\/em><\/p>\n

You probably won\u2019t agree, but tomorrow is a very special day for our industry and art form, marking the 1863 birth of the man who invented modern comics.<\/p>\n

Although fans and historians are never going to stop debating this one, Richard F. Outcault is credited with being the father of the modern comic strip. His breakthrough came in 1895: a scandalous creation dubbed The Yellow Kid<\/strong> manifested for legendary newspaperman Joseph Pulitzer and debuting in the New York World<\/strong> – where the feature was actually entitled Hogan\u2019s Alley<\/strong>. It shared cartoon shenanigans that captivated the reading public and even led to the coining of a new term… \u201cYellow Journalism\u201d…<\/p>\n

Outcault was notoriously fickle and quickly tired of his creation, and of subsequent features he created for William Randolph Hearst in the New York Journal<\/strong> during a particularly grave period of bitter newspaper circulation warfare.<\/p>\n

In 1902, he created a Little Lord Fauntleroy<\/em> style moppet called Buster Brown<\/strong>, but the angelic looks actually acted as camouflage for a little hellion perpetually wedded to mischief, pranks and poor decision making. Yet again Outcault quickly got bored and moved on, but this strip was another multimedia sensation, capturing public attention and thus spinning off a plethora of franchises.<\/p>\n

Our boy Buster was a merchandising bonanza. By a weird set of circumstances, Buster Brown Shoes<\/strong> became one of the biggest chain-stores in America, and in later years produced a periodical comic book Premium (a giveaway magazine free to purchasers) packed with some of the greatest comic artists and adventure stories the industry had ever seen. Outcault may have dumped Buster, but the little devil darling never quit comics…<\/p>\n

Way back in 1974 Dover Publications released this facsimile reproduction of an earlier collection from 1904, then entitled Buster Brown and his Resolutions<\/strong>, featuring 15 glorious full-colour strips from the first two years of the run, and it\u2019s about time they or someone else thought about doing it again. Maybe even publishing a far more comprehensive collected edition?
\n\"\"
\nUntil then, though, let\u2019s re-examine what we have here and meet the cherubic scion and his faithful dog Tige<\/em>, and perhaps ponder that if indelicate or untoward happenstance doesn\u2019t create another round of chaos in the ordered and genteel life of the well-to-do Mr. and Mrs. Brown<\/em>, then little Buster is always happy to pitch in and lend a hand.<\/p>\n

Each lavish page, rendered in a delightfully classical, illustrative line style – like Cruickshank or perhaps Charles Dana Gibson – ends with a moral or resolution, but one that is somehow subversively ambiguous.<\/p>\n

As Buster himself is wont to comment, \u201cPeople are usually good when there isn\u2019t anything else to do\u201d…<\/p>\n

Historically pivotal, Buster Brown<\/strong> is also thematically a landmark in content, and a direct ancestor of the mischievous child strip that dominated the family market of the 20th<\/sup> century. Could Dennis the Menace<\/strong> (\u201cours\u201d or \u201ctheirs\u201d), Minnie the Minx<\/strong>, Cedric<\/strong>, Ducoboo<\/strong> or Bart Simpson<\/strong> have existed without Buster or his contemporary rivals The Katzenjammer Kids<\/strong>?<\/p>\n

It\u2019s pointless to speculate, but it\u2019s no waste of time to find and enjoy this splendid strip.
\n\u00a9 1974 Dover Publications. All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n

Today in 1914 Belgian marvel Joseph Gillain<\/strong> aka Jij\u00e9<\/em><\/strong> was born, and in 1930 world changing strip Mickey Mouse<\/strong> debuted. Three years later so did creator\/writer (Star Hawks<\/strong>)\/historian Ron Goulart<\/strong>. You should read The Adventurous Decade – Comic Strips in the Thirties<\/a> <\/strong> and see why I\u2019m going on so.<\/p>\n

In 1956 we lost The Kin-der-Kids<\/strong> creator Lyonel Feininger<\/strong> and Britain suffered double death blows in 1968 with the cancelation of Wham!<\/strong> and Giggle<\/strong>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By\u00a0Richard F. Outcault with an introduction by August Derleth (Dover Publications) ISBN: 978- 0-1-486-23006-1 (Album PB) This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times. You probably won\u2019t agree, but tomorrow is a very special day for our industry and art form, marking the 1863 birth of the man who invented modern comics. Although … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Buster Brown: Early Strips in Full Color”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[113,78,122,125,127],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-34729","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-comedy","category-comic-strip-classics","category-historical","category-humour","category-nostalgia"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4AFj-929","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34729","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34729"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34729\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":34732,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34729\/revisions\/34732"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34729"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34729"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34729"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}