Canadian comics refers to comics and cartooning by citizens of Canada or permanent residents of Canada regardless of residence. Canada has two official languages, and distinct comics cultures have developed in English and French Canada. The English tends to follow American trends, and the French Franco-Belgian ones, with little crossover between the two cultures. Canadian comics run the gamut of comics forms, including editorial cartooning, comic strips, comic books, graphic novels, and webcomics, and are published in newspapers, magazines, books, and online.
Early history (1759-1910s)
Brigadier-General George Townshend's cartoons lampooning General James Wolfe in 1759 are recognized as the first examples of political cartooning in Canadian history. Cartoons did not have a regular forum in Canada until John Henry Walker's short-lived weekly Punch in Canada debuted in Montreal in 1849. The magazine was a Canadian version of Britain's humorous Punch and featured cartoons by Walker. It paved the way for a number of similar short-lived publications, until the success of the more straight-laced Canadian Illustrated News, published by George-Edouard Desbarats beginning in 1869, soon after Canadian Confederation.  In 1873, John Wilson Bengough founded Grip, a humour magazine in the style of Punch and the American Harper's Weekly. It featured a large number of cartoons, especially Bengough's own. The cartoons tended to be political, and Prime Minister John A. Macdonald and Metis rebel leader Louis Riel were favourite targets. The Pacific Scandal in the early 1870s gave Bengough much fodder to raise his reputation as a political caricaturist. According to historian John Bell, while Bengough was probably the most significant pre-20th-century Canadian cartoonist, Henri Julien was likely the most accomplished. Published widely both at home and abroad, Julien's cartoons appeared in periodicals such as Harper's Weekly and Le Monde illustre. In 1888, he gained employment at the Montreal Star and became the first full-time newspaper cartoonist in Canada.  Palmer Cox, a Canadian expatriate in the United States, at this time created The Brownies, a popular, widely merchandised phenomenon whose first book collection sold over a million copies. Cox began a Brownies comic strip in 1898 that was one of the earliest English-language strips, and had begun to use speech balloons by the time it ended in 1907.

Q: What happened during the early years?
A: Townshend's cartoons lampooning General James Wolfe in 1759 are recognized as the first examples of political cartooning in Canadian history.
What other successes were there?
John Henry Walker's short-lived weekly Punch in Canada debuted in Montreal in 1849.
John Henry Walker's short-lived weekly Punch in Canada debuted in Montreal in 1849.