Obscurity of the Day: Splinters

William Steinigans' favorite cartooning subject -- dogs -- is the subject of this simple and lively Sunday strip series, Splinters. Splinters the clown and his two pups were a regular feature of Pulitzer's Funny Side color sections from April 23 1911 to October 27 1912. The strip was also a semi-regular feature in the New York World's Fun magazine -- unfortunately there is no complete set of those magazines available as far as I know, so I can't offer running dates.

After a wonderful start as a mostly pantomime strip, Steinigans soon found himself at a loss for wordless gags, so dialogue became the norm. That's a shame because these early examples above are a real joy to behold. Later strips are more ho-hum run-of-the-mill productions. You can see lots more of these over at Barnacle Press.