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The Katzenjammer Kids is the longest running newspaper comic strip, and still runs in a few newspapers in the United States and several other countries. It started in 1897, and has a very interesting history that I may blog about at a later time. The strip involves two kids, Hanz and Fritz, who are generally mischievous, their mother Mama, and The Captain, whose relationship to Mama and the kids has never really been made clear. All of them speak in some kind of strange pseudo-German dialect, which I find kind of fun, and which I hope isn't offensive to anyone of a German persuasion. I don't find the Asian sailor in The Captain's crew to be quite as fun, but he only gets one line in this strip, so I can ignore it.

Since it's December, I felt the need to take some time and share some comic strips related to Christmas, because I like Christmas and I like comic strips. I also felt the need to share some comic strips that most people may not be familiar with. They were well-known in their time, but it seems that these days the only comic strip that most people know is Peanuts (which they often mistakenly call "Charlie Brown"). So, to start off, here's a Christmas comic strip featuring several comic strip characters of yesteryear:

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This is a Mutt and Jeff strip from 1913, drawn by Bud Fisher. You can see Mutt standing in the center giving the toast, with Jeff sitting to the left of him. Going counter-clockwise, we have R.F. Outcault's Buster Brown, Winsor McCay's Little Nemo, Nemo's buddy Flip, Frederick Burr Opper's Happy Hooligan, T.E. Powers' Gloom, E. Pluribus Dingbat from George Herriman's The Dingbat Family, Tad Dorgan's Silk Hat Harry, Mr. Newlywed and his baby from George…