The Little Bears may have been the first American comic strip

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....

. Drawn by Jimmy Swinnerton, it began its run in 1893 in the San Francisco Examiner, one of William Randolph Hearst

William Randolph Hearst

William Randolph Hearst was an American business magnate and leading newspaper publisher. Hearst entered the publishing business in 1887, after taking control of The San Francisco Examiner from his father...

's newspapers.

Comic strip historian Don Markstein

Don Markstein's Toonopedia

Don Markstein's Toonopedia was a web encyclopedia of print cartoons, comic strips and animation. Don D...

 described the work Swinnerton did at the Examiner and how the bears evolved:

His main job, back in that pre-photoengraving era, was to illustrate the news. But he also regularly drew editorial cartoons, sports cartoons, and a cute little bear cub to accompany the daily weather report, which would respond amusingly to predicted conditions. Before long, his bear cartoons had branched out, and were appearing all over the paper. More bears were added to the cast, and the feature was called, predictably enough, The Little Bears. It is generally believed to be the first series of American newspaper cartoons to feature ongoing characters. During that period, Swinnerton also drew cartoons about very small children. Sometimes, the two sets of cartoons would be placed together, in banners spanning the newspaper page, in a feature called Little Bears & Tykes. The first such banner appeared June 1, 1892.

In 1896, following a switch to the New York Journal, Swinnerton's feature switched from bears to tigers as he launched The Little Tigers. The change of animals apparently took place at the request of Hearst. Gradually a defined, philandering character emerged from the strip, and on November 1, 1903, the Sunday feature evolved into Mr. Jack

Mr. Jack

Mr. Jack was a "funny animal" comic strip by Jimmy Swinnerton which ran in William Randolph Hearst newspapers from about 1903 until 1935....

.

The Little Bears was an obvious influence on Gene Carr's Bearville (aka Bear Land) which ran in the New York Evening Journal from April 19 to May 7, 1901.