Another Prodigy of Strength!

Hugo Hercules was an early-Twentieth Century comic-strip character appearing in the Chicago Tribune. Debuting in 1902, the strip never garnered much interest and evaporated after one year. Hugo's illustrator, William Koerner, left the world of commercial art to take up a career in painting.

Like his mythological namesake, Hugo Hercules possessed incredible strength. This has lead some comic historians to dub Hugo the first superhero, predating the proto-superhero Doc Savage by thirty-one years and the immortal Superman by thirty-six. However, his lack of costume and secret-identity seems to establish this character as being a possible superhero antecedent, but not the genuine article.

Regardless, the comics are very amusing and an interesting historical artifact as well.

You can read the entire run of the strip here.