This week in 1916: SPARKS No.126

Here's a comic that the kids of 1916 were reading, exactly 100 years ago this week. Sparks was published by James Henderson and Sons Ltd. and ran from 1914 to 1917. Like most comics of the time, it consisted of 8 tabloid pages, although by the time this issue appeared the format had become shorter, almost square in shape.  

The cover strip, clearly inspired by Chips' Weary Willie and Tired Tim, was The Funny Adventures of Lemon and Dash. Like Willie and Tim, they were two wandering tramps getting into amusing situations every issue. The artwork was by Louis Briault (1885 to 1944), who also drew for comics such as The Funny Wonder, Comic Cuts, and Comic Life.

Like most comics of the day, Sparks carried a 50/50 split of prose stories and comic strips. The centre pages featured numerous short strips and gag cartoons crammed across the spread. Here are just some of them. as always, click on the pages to enlarge them.

One of the text stories, The Arch Rogue, featured Superman's catchphrase over 20 years before the Man of Steel even appeared. Up, up, and away!

On the back page, another mixture of strips and cartoons. Daniel Dauber was drawn by Walter Booth, who had a long career in comics throughout the first half of the 20th Century. I'm afraid I don't know the identities of the other artists, who are sadly all anonymous.