Meet "The Flintstones"

This pen-and-ink drawing prepared for "The Flintstones" comic strip shows Fred Flintstone using his vehicle to squeeze out the last bit of toothpaste in the tube.

Comic strips are a sequence of cartoons that are typically serialized and appear in newspapers and magazines.

"The Flintstones" comic strip (1961–1988), illustrated by Gene Hazelton, was adapted from a TV series that ran for six seasons between 1960 and 1966. It was the first animated prime-time series on network television, and until The Simpsons, the most financially successful one. The TV show and the strip dealt with domestic life and family issues in a prehistoric setting.

An animator and newspaper comic artist, Hazelton had worked for movie studios such as Walt Disney Studios, where he contributed animation drawings to films, including Fantasia and Pinocchio. During the 1950s, he was a freelance illustrator, and for over two decades beginning in 1961, he served as the chief illustrator for "The Flintstones" and the "Yogi Bear" newspaper strips for Hanna-Barbera, and he assisted with the studio's "The Jetsons."

This drawing is in the Graphic Arts Collection of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History and is not currently on display. View more comics in the Smithsonian’s collection.