NPR

The Old School: Classic Strips That Continue To Shape Comics

When we asked readers to name their favorite comics, many classic, hugely influential newspaper strips got nudged out of the running. We thought we'd give them a shout-out.
Richard F. Outcault's goofy, nightshirt-wearing, smart-alecky tyke became the breakout star of the newspaper strip <em>Hogan's Alley</em>, which debuted in 1895.

As you may have heard (AND I DEARLY HOPE YOU FRIGGIN' HAVE), our Summer Readers' Poll on Comics and Graphic Novels came out yesterday. You cast thousands of votes, and a crazily accomplished judging panel (which, due to some egregious error in the vetting process, also included me) combed over the top vote-getters, spent hours on the phone arguing for or against each one ... and then threw in some of their personal favorites.

The result: One hundred favorite comics — a list that includes well-loved classics and some charmingly personal, idiosyncratic picks.

But as the nature of any list is that some stuff gets left off. Given the voting pool demographics — and the fact that we asked them to name the comics for which they felt an enthusiastic personal connection — many of the comics that have, shall we say,

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