Once upon a time, people used to get something called "newspapers" delivered to their homes every day. And in these newspapers were something called "comic strips." Unlike the cramped, minimalist things of today, these comics were large, elaborate, often full-page affairs. And in the early days of comic strips one of the most popular was Little Nemo in Slumberland by Winsor McCay.

Nemo, who appeared in comic strips from 1905 to 1914, was a little boy who fell out of bed into adventures in the land of King Morpheus and his beautiful daughter, the Princess. Little Nemo was notable both for the gorgeous details of McCay's drawings and for the lush and surrealistic landscapes. While some of the recurring characters he meets would be considered offensive ethnic stereotypes, no one can deny the beauty of McCay's two-dimensional fantasy worlds.

Google is commemorating the 107th anniversary of artist Winsor McCay's comic masterpiece with an animated Doodle (visible in a sneak peek via google.com/sg) that follows Nemo through several levels of adventures, Inception-style. That the strip is animated is especially appropriate given that McCay was an earlier popularizer of the art form. Unlike the computer-generated films of today, each frame of McCay's cartoons were drawn by hand with pen and ink on paper. Even the backgrounds were redrawn, frame by frame.

McCay traveled around presenting live vaudeville shows in which he interacted with an onscreen drawing. Ironically, his drawings were so life-like that audiences refused to believe they weren't seeing people in costumes. The artist addressed that objection by creating Gertie the Dinosaur, a brontosaurus who was definitely not humanoid. Gertie is considered the first animated character to exhibit her own personality – she plays with McCay on stage and reacts to his teasing.

McCay's Nemo got an updated treatment in the 1989 full-length feature movie Little Nemo: Adventures in Slumberland written by Chris Columbus. However, that version didn't preserve McCay's almost delicate pen-and-ink style. A Blu-ray version is set for release this year. But to learn about and savor McCay's original style, check out Winsor McCay: His Life and Art by Academy-Award-winning animator John Canemaker.