Tintin, perhaps the best-loved comic character ever, celebrates his 75th anniversary on Saturday.
In these 75 years, Tintin, the creation of Belgian author Herge (real name Georges Remi), discovered an Inca tribe, went to the moon, and battled drug-runners, mad scientists, spies, Latin American guerrillas, dictators and many others. He even had a brush with Yeti, the abominable snowman, in 'Tintin in Tibet'.
Assisting him in these fantastic adventures were his dog Snowy and friends Professor Calculus and Captain Haddock, a whiskey-loving ex-seaman with a language peppered with curses like 'Slubberdegullions and Kleptomaniacs'.
The cub reporter first appeared in print on January 10, 1929, in a comic supplement to the Brussels newspaper Le Vingtieme Siecle.
That adventure, 'Tintin in the Land of the Soviets', was followed by 23 others, including one left unfinished on Herge's death in 1983.
The comics have sold more than 200 million copies around the world and translated into 55 languages.
Hollywood director Steven Spielberg said in 2002 he planned to make a trilogy of films based on the cub reporter's adventures.
According to the BBC, two Belgian newspapers -- Le Soir and La Libre Belgique -- will fill Saturday editions with Tintin strips, while France's Le Figaro will print a special 114-page Tintin issue.
An exhibition of Tintin art is to take be held in Brussels, while other shows will take place in Spain, the Netherlands and Britain.
The Brussels celebrations will also include a tour to some of the scenery that inspired the adventures.
On Thursday, a 10-euro commemorative coin featuring Tintin and Snowy was unveiled.
"The comic books of Herge have conferred the highest nobility on Belgian art," Belgium's Finance Minister Didier Reynders was quoted as saying at the unveiling.
