Today in the history of the American comic strip: June 4

American cartoonists and writers may not have invented the comic strip, but some argue that the comics, as we know them today, are an American creation. Clearly, the United States has played an outsize role in the development of this underappreciated art form.

6.4.1884: Fontaine Fox, the creator of  Toonerville Folks (1908-1955), is born near Louisville, Kentucky.

6.4.1965: The full name of Joel, the bearded, barely intelligible trashman in Frank King’s Gasoline Alley who drives a wagon drawn by a mule named Betsy, is revealed. It's Joseph L. Smith.

6.4.1973: Stars and Stripes drops Doonesbury, but it is reinstated after the paper receives nearly 300 letters of protest.

6.4.1982: Henning Dahl Mikkelsen, the Danish-born creator of Ferdinand (1937-2012), dies in the United States at 67.

6.4.1988: Milton Caniff's Steve Canyon ends its 41-year run shortly after Caniff's death on April 3, 1988.

6.4.1989: Dik Browne, co-creator and illustrator of Hi and Lois (1954-present) and the creator of Hägar the Horrible (1973-present), dies in Sarasota, Florida, at 71.

6.4.2010: Marmaduke, a comedy film, is released. It's an adaptation of Brad Anderson’s comic strip of the same name.

6.4.2014: Bill Watterson, who retired Calvin and Hobbes in 1995, resurfaces with the first of three Watterson-drawn strips that replaced the work of Pearls Before Swine cartoonist Stephan Pastis in Pastis’ comic. Watterson's contributions were described in the strip as the work of a second grader who claimed she could draw better than Pastis. 

Hi and Lois

Most of the information listed here from one day to the next comes from two online sites -- Wikipedia, and Don Markstein's Toonopedia -- as well as 100 Years of American Newspaper Comics, edited by Maurice Horn. Note that my focus is on American newspaper comic strips (and the occasional foreign strip that gained popularity in the United States). Thus, comic books and exclusively online comics are not included here.