Old Doc Yak
Encyclopedia
Old Doc Yak was a comic strip
by Sidney Smith that centered around a talking goat. The origin of the character was Buck Nix, a goat Smith drew in 1908 for the Chicago Evening Journal. For three years, Nix romanced a she-goat called Nanny. In 1911, when Smith moved to the Chicago Tribune, he introduced a new goat character when Old Doc Yak began as a daily strip
on February 5, 1912 with the Sunday page
starting a month later on March 10.
, showing the Gumps moving into the house formerly occupied by the Yak family.
from Shanda Fantasy Arts. A masked figure called Bullethead arranges for the anthropomorphic heroes of the title to be distracted while he goes after a mysterious item; he turns out to be Doc Yak, who just wants his old license plate back (after losing it decades ago to the Gumps).
Comic strip
A comic strip is a sequence of drawings arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often serialized, with text in balloons and captions....
by Sidney Smith that centered around a talking goat. The origin of the character was Buck Nix, a goat Smith drew in 1908 for the Chicago Evening Journal. For three years, Nix romanced a she-goat called Nanny. In 1911, when Smith moved to the Chicago Tribune, he introduced a new goat character when Old Doc Yak began as a daily strip
Daily strip
A daily strip is a newspaper comic strip format, appearing on weekdays, Monday through Saturday, as contrasted with a Sunday strip, which typically only appears on Sundays....
on February 5, 1912 with the Sunday page
Sunday strip
A Sunday strip is a newspaper comic strip format, where comic strips are printed in the Sunday newspaper, usually in a special section called the Sunday comics, and virtually always in color. Some readers called these sections the Sunday funnies...
starting a month later on March 10.
Yak moves out
Doc Yak was a family man and more mature than Buck Nix. He had a son, Yutch, along with a number of domestic problems. The last Old Doc Yak strip, on February 10, 1917, depicted Yak and his family moving out while wondering who might move into the house next. The last panel showed the empty house. The next day's newspapers, in the space formerly occupied by Old Doc Yak, printed the very first strip of Smith's The GumpsThe Gumps
The Gumps, a popular comic strip about a middle-class family, was created by Sidney Smith in 1917, launching a 42-year run in newspapers from February 12, 1917 until October 17, 1959....
, showing the Gumps moving into the house formerly occupied by the Yak family.
Later appearances
In 1998, Old Doc Yak and Yutch appeared in Valiant Varmints, a one-shot comic bookComic book
A comic book or comicbook is a magazine made up of comics, narrative artwork in the form of separate panels that represent individual scenes, often accompanied by dialog as well as including...
from Shanda Fantasy Arts. A masked figure called Bullethead arranges for the anthropomorphic heroes of the title to be distracted while he goes after a mysterious item; he turns out to be Doc Yak, who just wants his old license plate back (after losing it decades ago to the Gumps).