Editing Little Orphan Annie (section)

==Characters==
{{Unreferenced section|date=September 2022}}
Annie is a ten-year-old orphan. Her distinguishing physical characteristics are curly red hair, a red dress and vacant circles for eyes. Her [[catchphrase]]s are "Gee whiskers" and "Leapin' lizards!" In the comic, Annie attributes her lasting youthfulness to her birthday being on February 29 in a [[leap year]], and ages only one year in appearance for every four years that pass.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2016-02-23 |title=Leapin' Lizards! Lombard plans Orphan Annie party |url=https://www.dailyherald.com/article/20160223/news/160229509/ |access-date=2022-09-12 |website=Daily Herald |language=en-US}}</ref> Annie is a plucky, generous, compassionate, and optimistic youngster who can hold her own against bullies, and has a strong and intuitive sense of right and wrong.

Sandy enters the story in a January 1925 strip as a puppy of no particular breed which Annie rescues from a gang of abusive boys. The girl is working as a drudge in Mrs. Bottle's grocery store at the time and manages to keep the puppy briefly concealed. She finally gives him to Paddy Lynch, a gentle man who owns a "steak joint" and can give Sandy a good home. Sandy is a mature dog when he suddenly reappears in a May 1925 strip to rescue Annie from gypsy kidnappers. Annie and Sandy remain together thereafter.

Oliver "Daddy" Warbucks first appears in a September 1924 strip and reveals a month later he was formerly a small machine shop owner who acquired his enormous wealth producing munitions during [[World War I]]. He is a large, powerfully-built bald man, the idealized capitalist, who typically wears a tuxedo and diamond stickpin in his shirtfront. He likes Annie at once, instructing her to call him "Daddy", but his wife (the daughter of a plumber's assistant) is a snobbish, gossiping ''[[nouveau riche]]'' who derides her husband's affection for Annie. When Warbucks is suddenly called to Siberia on business, his wife spitefully sends Annie back to the orphanage.

Other major characters include Warbucks' right-hand men: Punjab, an eight-foot native of India, introduced in 1935, and the Asp, an inscrutably generalized [[East Asia]]n, who first appeared in 1937. Also introduced in 1937 was the mysterious Mr. Am, a bearded sage millions of years old, whose supernatural powers include bringing the dead back to life.