Misplaced Pages

#681318

88-397: Peanuts is a syndicated daily and Sunday American comic strip written and illustrated by Charles M. Schulz . The strip's original run extended from 1950 to 2000, continuing in reruns afterward. Peanuts is among the most popular and influential in the history of comic strips, with 17,897 strips published in all, making it "arguably the longest story ever told by one human being". At

176-679: A daily strip on October 2, 1950, in seven newspapers: the Minneapolis Star , a hometown newspaper of Schulz (page 37, along with a short article); The Washington Post ; Chicago Tribune ; The Denver Post ; The Seattle Times ; and two newspapers in Pennsylvania , Evening Chronicle ( Allentown ) and Globe-Times ( Bethlehem ). The first strip was four panels long and showed Charlie Brown walking by two other young children, Shermy and Patty . Shermy lauds Charlie Brown as he walks by, but then tells Patty how he hates him in

264-477: A "skating" competition, only to learn with disastrous results that it is for roller skating and not ice skating . She struggles at school and with her homework and often falls asleep in school. The wife of Charles Schulz, Jean Schulz, suggested that this is the consequence of how Peppermint Patty's single father works late; she stays awake at night waiting for him. In general, Charles Schulz imagined that some of her problems were from having an absent mother. Marcie

352-625: A 1987 interview with Frank Pauer in Dayton Daily News and Journal Herald Magazine Peanuts had its origin in Li'l Folks , a weekly panel cartoon that appeared in Schulz's hometown newspaper, the St. Paul Pioneer Press , from 1947 to 1950. Elementary details of the cartoon shared similarities to Peanuts . The name "Charlie Brown" was first used there. The series also had a dog that looked much like

440-453: A blanket for comfort . The idea of his "security blanket" originated from Schulz's own observation of his first three children, who carried around blankets. Schulz described Linus's blanket as "probably the single best thing that I ever thought of". He was proud of its versatility for visual humor in the strip, and with how the phrase "security blanket" entered the dictionary. Peppermint Patty and Marcie are two girls who are friends. They attend

528-455: A blue sky background. Above his head, several panels from past strips were overlaid. Underneath these panels, the full note that Schulz had written to his fans was printed (part of it had been omitted in the final daily strip). It read as follows: Dear Friends, I have been fortunate to draw Charlie Brown and his friends for almost fifty years. It has been the fulfillment of my childhood ambition. Unfortunately, I am no longer able to maintain

616-410: A boy being mean to girls would not be funny at all, describing a pattern in comic strip writing where it is comical when supposedly weak characters dominate supposedly strong characters. Lucy at times acts as a psychiatrist and charges five cents for psychiatric advice to other characters (usually Charlie Brown) from her "psychiatric booth", a booth parodying the setup of a lemonade stand . Lucy's role as

704-439: A different school than Charlie Brown, on the other side of town, and so represent a slightly different social circle from the other characters. Peppermint Patty is a tomboy who is forthright and loyal and has what Schulz described as a "devastating singleness of purpose". She frequently misunderstands things, to the extent that her confusion serves as the premise of many individual strips and stories; in one story she prepares for

792-502: A distinct Christian theme, though the popular perspective has been to view the franchise through a secular lens. During the week of July 29, 1968, Schulz debuted the African American character Franklin to the strip, at the urging of white Jewish Los Angeles schoolteacher Harriet Glickman. Though Schulz feared that adding a black character would be seen as patronizing to the African American community, Glickman convinced him that

880-438: A feature rerunning the entire history of the strip from the beginning in colorized form. This was done to honor the 65th anniversary of the strip's debut. Charlie Brown is a young boy. He is the main character, acting as the center of the strip's world and serving as an everyman . While seen as decent, considerate, and reflective, he is also awkward, deeply sensitive, and said to suffer from an inferiority complex . Charlie Brown

968-777: A foreground character by the middle of the 1990s. Schulz received the National Cartoonists Society Humor Comic Strip Award for Peanuts in 1962, the Reuben Award in 1955 and 1964 (the first cartoonist to receive the honor twice), the Elzie Segar Award in 1980, and the Milton Caniff Lifetime Achievement Award in 1999. A Charlie Brown Christmas won a Peabody Award and an Emmy ; Peanuts cartoon specials have received

SECTION 10

#1732765963682

1056-535: A game of football in the rain by herself. Marcie comes up, carrying an umbrella and remarking that everyone has gone home. Peppermint Patty laments that they never shook hands and said "good game". The January 3 strip consisted of a drawing of Snoopy sitting atop his doghouse with his typewriter, as he had done many times over the course of the strip's lifespan. The drawing was accompanied by a printed note from Schulz which officially announced his retirement from drawing and thanking his readers for their support. Although

1144-629: A large industry. Syndication properly took off in 1896 when the competitors the New York World and the New York Journal began producing Sunday comic pages. The daily comic strip came into practice in 1907, revolutionizing and expanding the syndication business. Syndicates began providing client newspaper with proof sheets of black-and-white line art for the reproduction of strips." By 1984, 300 syndicates were distributing 10,000 features with combined sales of $ 100 million

1232-487: A little boy named "5" to the cast, whose sisters were named "3" and "4," and whose father had changed their family name to their ZIP Code , giving in to the way numbers were taking over people's identities. Also in 1963, one strip showed Sally being secretive about school prayer, in reference to the Supreme Court decisions on it that year. In 1958, a strip in which Snoopy tossed Linus into the air and boasted that he

1320-602: A much lesser cost than if the client were to purchase the material themselves. Generally, syndicates sell their material to one client in each territory. News agencies differ in that they distribute news articles to all interested parties. Typical syndicated features are advice columns (parenting, health, finance, gardening, cooking, etc.), humor columns , editorial opinion, critic 's reviews, and gossip columns . Some syndicates specialize in one type of feature, such as comic strips. A comic strip syndicate functions as an agent for cartoonists and comic strip creators, placing

1408-442: A psychiatrist has attracted attention from real-life individuals in the field of psychology; the psychiatrist Athar Yawar playfully identified various moments in the strip where her activities could be characterized as pursuing medical and scientific interests, commenting that "Lucy is very much the modern doctor". Linus is Charlie Brown's most loyal and uplifting friend and introduces intellectual, spiritual and reflective elements to

1496-474: A rich character is that he's not purely a loser. The self-loathing that causes him so much anguish is decidedly not self-effacement. Charlie Brown is optimistic enough to think he can earn a sense of self-worth." Schulz named Charlie Brown after a colleague of his while working at Art Instruction , whose full name was Charlie Francis Brown. Readers and critics have explored the question as to whether Schulz based Charlie Brown on himself. This question often carried

1584-713: A score of newspapers in the U.S. northeast. By the end of the Civil War, three syndicates were in operation, selling news items and short fiction pieces. By 1881, Associated Press correspondent Henry Villard was self-syndicating material to the Chicago Tribune , the Cincinnati Commercial , and the New York Herald . A few years later, the New York Sun ' s Charles A. Dana formed

1672-416: A series of reruns of older strips would begin on January 4, 2000, there were still six unpublished Sunday strips that Schulz had completed. The first of these ran on January 9, featuring Rerun and Snoopy playing in the snow. The second featured the last appearance of Woodstock, as he and Snoopy in one last fantasy sequence are called upon by George Washington to chop firewood. Rerun makes his final appearance in

1760-472: A snowball fight between Peppermint Patty and Marcie and Charlie Brown and Linus, with Snoopy sitting behind the fight trying to figure out how to throw a snowball. The strip was notable because, in addition to it being the last daily strip with a story, Schulz's health had deteriorated to the point where the lettering in the strip had to be done by computer. The Sunday strip featured the last appearances of Peppermint Patty and Marcie, with Peppermint Patty playing

1848-417: A social circle of young children, where adults exist but are rarely seen or heard . The main character, Charlie Brown , is meek, nervous, and lacks self-confidence. He is unable to fly a kite, win a baseball game, or kick a football held by his irascible friend Lucy , who always pulls it away at the last instant. Peanuts is a literate strip with philosophical, psychological, and sociological overtones, which

SECTION 20

#1732765963682

1936-424: A sports strip on the sports page. Initially, a newspaper page included only a single daily strip, usually either at the top or the bottom of the page. By the 1920s, many newspapers gathered the strips together on a single page, along with news articles, columns, puzzles and/or other illustrated features. In many newspapers, the width of the strips made possible an arrangement of the strips into two stacks displayed from

2024-488: A syndicate to sell the short stories of Bret Harte and Henry James . The first full-fledged American newspaper syndicate was the McClure Newspaper Syndicate , launched in 1884 by publisher S. S. McClure . It was the first successful company of its kind, turning the marketing of columns , book serials (by the likes of Rudyard Kipling and Arthur Conan Doyle ), and eventually comic strips , into

2112-424: A tongue-in-cheek letter to a fan in 1955. Similarly Frieda , a girl with "naturally curly hair", was introduced in 1962, but was already being phased out by the late 1960s after her comic value had seemed to have rapidly run its course; and after 1975, she made only background appearances. Conversely, Rerun , the youngest brother of Linus and Lucy, had only limited visibility after his introduction in 1973, but became

2200-583: A total of two Peabody Awards and four Emmys . For his work on the strip, Schulz has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame (as does Snoopy) and a place in the William Randolph Hearst Cartoon Hall of Fame. Peanuts was featured on the cover of Time on April 9, 1965, with the accompanying article calling it "the leader of a refreshing new breed that takes an unprecedented interest in the basics of life." The strip

2288-433: A whole is a personal expression, and so it is impossible to avoid all the characters presenting aspects of his personality. Biographer David Michaelis made a similar conclusion, describing Charlie Brown as simply representing Schulz's "wishy-washiness and determination". Regardless, some profiles of Schulz confidently held that Charlie Brown was based on him. All and all, Charlie Brown is a purely wholesome character. Snoopy

2376-686: A year. With the 1960s advent of the underground press , associations like the Underground Press Syndicate , and later the Association of Alternative Newsmedia , worked together to syndicate material — including weekly comic strips — for each other's publications. Prominent contemporary syndication services include: IFA-Amsterdam (International Feature Agency) provides news and lifestyle content to publications. Cagle Cartoons offers newspaper editorial cartoons and columns. 3DSyndication comprises syndication service from India,

2464-441: Is Franklin's presence in a racially integrated school and neighborhood. (Franklin's creation occurred at least in part as a result of Schulz's 1968 correspondence with a socially progressive fan.) The fact that Charlie Brown's baseball team had three girls on it was also at least ten years ahead of its time. The 1966 prime time television special Charlie Brown's All Stars! dealt with Charlie Brown refusing sponsorship of his team on

2552-470: Is a constant failure: he can never win a ballgame; he can never successfully fly a kite. His sense of determination regardless of the certainty of failure can be interpreted as either self-defeating stubbornness or admirable persistence. When he fails, however, he experiences pain and anguish through self-pity. The journalist Christopher Caldwell observed this tension between Charlie Brown's negative and positive attitudes, stating: "What makes Charlie Brown such

2640-454: Is a dog, who later in the development of the strip would be described as a beagle . While generally behaving like a real dog and having a non-speaking role, he connects to readers through having human thoughts. Despite acting like a real dog some of the time, Snoopy possesses many different anthropomorphic traits. Most notably, he frequently walks on his hind legs and is able to use tools, including his typewriter. He introduces fantasy elements to

2728-506: Is based on classic Schulz stories from decades past, as well as including some classic strips by Schulz, mostly Sunday color strips. In early 2011, United Media (the parent of United Feature Syndicate) struck a distribution deal with Universal Uclick (now known as Andrews McMeel Syndication ) for syndication of the company's 150 comic strip and news features, including Peanuts . On January 5, 2015, Universal Uclick's website, GoComics , announced on that it would be launching "Peanuts Begins",

Peanuts - Misplaced Pages Continue

2816-474: Is bookish and a good student. Schulz described her as relatively perceptive compared to other characters, stating that "she sees the truth in things" (although she perpetually addresses Peppermint Patty as "sir"). The writer Laura Bradley identified her role as "the unassuming one with sage-like insights". In addition to the core cast, other characters appeared regularly for a majority of the strip's duration: Several early characters faded out of prominence during

2904-563: Is commonly regarded as the first daily comic strip, launched November 15, 1907 (under its initial title, A. Mutt ) on the sports pages of the San Francisco Chronicle . The featured character had previously appeared in sports cartoons by Fisher but was unnamed. Fisher had approached his editor, John P. Young , about doing a regular strip as early as 1905 but was turned down. According to Fisher, Young told him, "It would take up too much room, and readers are used to reading down

2992-468: Is made between continuity strips which have continuous storylines and gag-a-days in which the same characters appear in different humorous situations with no ongoing plot. In some cases, a gag-a-day strip might depict different characters each day. Writer-artist Jim Scancarelli attempts an overlap by inserting daily gags into his Gasoline Alley continuity storylines. Newspapers can display strips on separate pages randomly or thematically, such as placing

3080-548: Is so pervasive it is almost taken for granted." Batiuk also described the depth of emotion in Peanuts : "Just beneath the cheerful surface were vulnerabilities and anxieties that we all experienced, but were reluctant to acknowledge. By sharing those feelings with us, Schulz showed us a vital aspect of our common humanity, which is, it seems to me, the ultimate goal of great art." Cartoon tributes have appeared in other comic strips since Schulz's death in 2000 and are now displayed at

3168-409: Is the younger brother, and Lucy is the older sister. Lucy is bossy, selfish and opinionated, and she often delivers commentary in an honest albeit offensive and sarcastic way. Schulz described Lucy as full of misdirected confidence, but having the virtue of being capable of cutting right down to the truth. He said that Lucy is mean because it is funny, particularly because she is a girl: he posited that

3256-930: The Charles Schulz Museum . On May 27, 2000, many cartoonists collaborated to include references to Peanuts in their strips. Originally planned as a tribute to Schulz's retirement, after his death that February it became a tribute to his life and career. Similarly, on October 30, 2005, several comic strips again included references to Peanuts and specifically the It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown television special. On November 26, 2022, several cartoonists included references to Peanuts and Charles Schulz in their strips to celebrate his 100th birthday. Robert L. Short interpreted certain themes and conversations in Peanuts as consistent with parts of Christian theology and used them as illustrations in his lectures on

3344-530: The Tribune Content Agency and The Washington Post Writers Group also in the running. Syndication of editorial cartoons has an important impact on the form, since cartoons about local issues or politicians are not of interest to the national market. Therefore, an artist who contracts with a syndicate will either be one who already focuses their work on national and global issues, or will shift focus accordingly. An early version of syndication

3432-407: The "Top 50 Greatest Cartoon Characters of All Time", published to commemorate its 50th anniversary. Schulz was included in the touring exhibition "Masters of American Comics". His work was described as "psychologically complex", and his style as "perfectly in keeping with the style of its times." Despite the widespread acclaim Peanuts has received, some critics have alleged a decline in quality in

3520-431: The "World War One Flying Ace", Frieda and her "naturally curly hair", and Franklin. Peanuts is remarkable for its deft social commentary , especially compared with other strips appearing in the 1950s and early 1960s. Schulz did not explicitly address racial and gender equality issues so much as assume them to be self-evident. Peppermint Patty's athletic skill and self-confidence are simply taken for granted, for example, as

3608-559: The 1930s, the original art for a daily strip could be drawn as large as 25 inches wide by six inches high. As strips have become smaller, the number of panels has been reduced. In some cases today, the daily strip and Sunday strip dimensions are almost the same. For instance, a daily strip in The Arizona Republic measures 4 3/4" wide by 1 1/2" deep, while the three-tiered Hägar the Horrible Sunday strip in

Peanuts - Misplaced Pages Continue

3696-565: The 1960s. The classic television special A Charlie Brown Christmas from 1965, features the character Linus van Pelt quoting the King James Version of the Bible (Luke 2:8–14) to explain to Charlie Brown what Christmas is all about (in personal interviews, Schulz mentioned that Linus represented his spiritual side). Because of the explicit religious material in A Charlie Brown Christmas , many have interpreted Schulz's work as having

3784-600: The 1970s, "went from being the strip's besetting artistic weakness to ruining it altogether". Many cartoonists who came after Schulz have cited his work as an influence, including Lynn Johnston , Patrick McDonnell , and Cathy Guisewite , the latter of whom stated, "A comic strip like mine would never have existed if Charles Schulz hadn't paved the way". The December 1997 issue of The Comics Journal featured an extensive collection of testimonials to Peanuts. Over 40 cartoonists, from mainstream newspaper cartoonists to underground, independent comic artists, shared reflections on

3872-498: The India Today Group's Syndications Today , and Times Syndication Service of India. Daily comic strip A daily strip is a newspaper comic strip format, appearing on weekdays, Monday through Saturday, as contrasted with a Sunday strip , which typically only appears on Sundays. They typically are smaller, 3–4 grids compared to the full page Sunday strip and are black and white. Bud Fisher 's Mutt and Jeff

3960-486: The addition of Black characters could help normalize the idea of friendships between children of different ethnicities. Franklin appeared in a trio of strips set at a beach, in which he first gets Charlie Brown's beach ball from the water and subsequently helps him build a sand castle, during which he mentions that his father is in Vietnam. In 1975, the panel format was shortened slightly horizontally, and shortly thereafter

4048-407: The advantage of making space for additional strips but often resulted in a crowded, unattractive page design. More often during the 1930s and 1940s, the title was typeset (in all upper case letters) and positioned to the right in the white space area above that strip, with the byline on the right. An episode subtitle (in upper and lower case) was centred between the title and the byline. In later years,

4136-691: The adventures of Winnie Winkle , Moon Mullins and Dondi , and waited each fall to see how Lucy would manage to trick Charlie Brown into trying to kick that football. (After I left for college, my father would clip out that strip each year and send it to me just to make sure I didn't miss it.)" Collections of such clipped daily strips can now be found in various archives, including Steve Cottle's online I Love Comix Archive. Comics historian Bill Blackbeard had tens of thousands of daily strips clipped and organized chronologically. Blackbeard's San Francisco Academy of Comic Art Collection, consisting of 2.5 million clippings, tearsheets and comic sections, spanning

4224-418: The cartoons and strips in as many newspapers as possible on behalf of the artist. In some cases, the work will be owned by the syndicate as opposed to the creator. A syndicate can annually receive thousands of submissions from which only two or three might be selected for representation. The leading strip syndicates include Andrews McMeel Syndication , King Features Syndicate , and Creators Syndicate , with

4312-500: The condition he fire the girls and Snoopy, because the league does not allow girls or dogs to play. Schulz threw satirical barbs at any number of topics when he chose. His child and animal characters satirized the adult world. Over the years he tackled everything from the Vietnam War to school dress codes to " New Math ". The May 20, 1962 strip featured an icon that stated "Defend Freedom, Buy U.S. Savings Bonds ." In 1963 he added

4400-419: The dwindling size of the comics page. In the late 1970s, during Schulz's negotiations with United Feature Syndicate over a new contract, syndicate president William C. Payette hired superhero comic artist Al Plastino to draw a backlog of Peanuts strips to hold in reserve in case Schulz left the strip. When Schulz and the syndicate reached a successful agreement, United Media stored these unpublished strips,

4488-495: The early 1950s version of Snoopy. Schulz submitted his Li'l Folks cartoons to United Features Syndicate (UFS), who responded with interest. He visited the syndicate in New York City and presented a package of new comic strips he had worked on, rather than the panel cartoons he submitted. UFS found they preferred the comic strip. When UFS was preparing to syndicate the comic strip as Li'l Folk , Tack Knight, who authored

SECTION 50

#1732765963682

4576-452: The entire width of the newspaper, and were sometimes three or more inches in height. In the 1920s, an eight-column newspaper usually ran a daily strip over six columns. Over decades, the size of daily strips became smaller and smaller, until by the year 2000, four standard daily strips could fit in an area once occupied by a single daily strip. Larger sizes have returned with today's digital distribution by DailyINK and other services. During

4664-598: The existence of which eventually became public. Plastino himself also claimed to have ghostwritten for Schulz while Schulz underwent heart surgery in 1983. In the 1980s and the 1990s, the strip remained the most popular comic in history, even though other comics, such as Garfield and Calvin and Hobbes , rivaled Peanuts in popularity. Schulz continued to write the strip until announcing his retirement on December 14, 1999, due to his failing health. The last three Peanuts strips were run from Saturday, January 1, 2000, through Monday, January 3, 2000. The Saturday strip showed

4752-816: The final panel. Snoopy was also an early character in the strip, first appearing in the third strip, which ran on October 4. Its first Sunday strip appeared January 6, 1952, in the half-page format, which was the only complete format for the entire life of the Sunday strip. Most of the other characters that eventually became regulars of the strip did not appear until later: Violet (February 1951), Schroeder (May 1951), Lucy (March 1952), Linus (September 1952), Pig-Pen (July 1954), Sally (August 1959), Frieda (March 1961), "Peppermint" Patty (August 1966), Franklin (July 1968), Woodstock (introduced March 1966, officially named June 1970), Marcie (July 1971), and Rerun (March 1973). Schulz decided to produce all aspects of

4840-427: The fourth, trying to paint something other than flowers in art class, and Sally makes her last appearance in the fifth conversing with Charlie Brown about love letters. The final Peanuts strip, as shown here, ran on February 13, 2000, the night after Schulz died from a heart attack. It consisted of two small panels across the top and a large panel at the bottom. The title panel shows Charlie Brown talking to someone on

4928-439: The gospel, as explained in his book The Gospel According to Peanuts , the first of several he wrote on religion, Peanuts , and popular culture. Print syndication The syndicate is an agency that offers features from notable journalists and authorities as well as reliable and established cartoonists. It fills a need among smaller weekly and daily newspapers for material that helps them compete with large urban papers, at

5016-403: The importance of crafting the strip himself: "This is not a crazy business about slinging ink. This is a deadly serious business." While the strip in its early years resembles its later form, there are significant differences. The art was cleaner, sleeker, and simpler, with thicker lines and short, squat characters. For example, in these early strips, Charlie Brown's famous round head is closer to

5104-521: The later years of its run, as Schulz frequently digressed from the more cerebral socio-psychological themes that characterized his earlier work in favor of lighter, more whimsical fare. For example, in an essay published in the New York Press at the time of the final daily strip in January 2000, "Against Snoopy", Christopher Caldwell argued that Snoopy, and the strip's increased focus on him in

5192-435: The leading single gag panels for decades, Grin and Bear It , was created in 1932 by George Lichty and initially syndicated by United Feature Syndicate . Throughout the 20th century, daily newspaper strips were usually presented in black and white and Sunday strips in colour, but a few newspapers have published daily strips in colour, and some newspapers, such as Grit , have published Sunday strips in black and white. On

5280-458: The lettering became larger to compensate. Previously, the daily Peanuts strips were formatted in a four-panel "space saving" format beginning in the 1950s, with a few very rare eight-panel strips, that still fit into the four-panel mold. Beginning on Leap Day in 1988, Schulz abandoned the four-panel format in favor of three-panel dailies and occasionally used the entire length of the strip as one panel, partly for experimentation, but also to combat

5368-437: The miserable title Peanuts , which I hate and have always hated. It has no dignity and it's not descriptive. [...] What could I do? Here I was, an unknown kid from St. Paul . I couldn't think of anything else. I said, why don't we call it Charlie Brown and the president said "Well, we can't copyright a name like that." I didn't ask them about Nancy or Steve Canyon . I was in no position to argue. —Charles Schulz, in

SECTION 60

#1732765963682

5456-470: The package, however, come from the 1960s. Peanuts continues to be prevalent in multiple media through widespread syndication, the publication of The Complete Peanuts , the release of several new television specials (all of which Schulz had worked on, but had not finished, before his death), and Peanuts Motion Comics . Additionally, BOOM! Studios has published a series of comic books that feature new material by new writers and artists, although some of it

5544-758: The page, and not horizontally." Other cartoonists followed the trend set by Fisher, as noted by comic strip historian R. C. Harvey : In the early 1900s, William Randolph Hearst 's weekday morning and afternoon papers around the country featured scattered black-and-white comic strips, and on January 31, 1912, Hearst introduced the nation's first full daily comics page in his Evening Journal . The two conventional formats for daily newspaper comics are strips and single gag panels . The strips are usually displayed horizontally, wider than they are tall. Strips are usually, but not always, broken up into several smaller panels with continuity from panel to panel. Single panels are square, circular or taller than they are wide. One of

5632-459: The power and influence of Schulz's art. Gilbert Hernandez wrote, " Peanuts was and still is for me a revelation. It's mostly from Peanuts where I was inspired to create the village of Palomar in Love and Rockets . Schulz's characters, the humor, the insight ... gush, gush, gush, bow, bow, bow, grovel, grovel, grovel ..." Tom Batiuk wrote: "The influence of Charles Schulz on the craft of cartooning

5720-462: The production manager at UFS of not having even seen the comic strip before giving it a title, and he said that the title would only make sense if there was a character named "Peanuts". On the day it was syndicated, Schulz's friend visited a news stand in uptown Minneapolis and asked if there were any newspapers that carried Peanuts , to which the newsdealer replied, "No, and we don't have any with popcorn either", which confirmed Schulz's fears concerning

5808-409: The production manager of UFS noted the popularity of the children's program Howdy Doody . The show featured an audience of children who were seated in the " Peanut Gallery ", and were referred to as "Peanuts". This inspired the decided title that was forced upon Schulz, to his consternation. Schulz hated the title Peanuts , which remained a source of irritation to him throughout his life. He accused

5896-426: The retired 1930s comic strip Little Folks , sought to claim exclusive rights to the title being used. Schulz argued in a letter to Knight that the contraction of Little to Li'l was intended to avoid this conflict, but conceded that the final decision would be for the syndicate. A different name for the comic strip became necessary after legal advice confirmed that Little Folks was a registered trademark. Meanwhile,

5984-725: The same paper is 5" wide by 3 3/8" deep. The popularity and accessibility of strips meant they were often clipped and saved or posted on bulletin boards or refrigerators. Authors John Updike and Ray Bradbury have written about their childhood collections of clipped strips. Many readers related to J. R. Williams ' homespun humour and clipped his long-run daily panel, Out Our Way . As noted by Coulton Waugh in his 1947 book, The Comics , anecdotal evidence indicated that more of Williams' daily cartoons were clipped and saved than any other newspaper comic strip. Strips had an ancillary form of distribution when they were clipped and mailed, as noted by The Baltimore Sun ' s Linda White: "I followed

6072-504: The schedule demanded by a daily comic strip. My family does not wish "Peanuts" to be continued by anyone else , therefore I am announcing my retirement. I have been grateful over the years for the loyalty of our editors and the wonderful support and love expressed to me by fans of the comic strip. Charlie Brown, Snoopy, Linus, Lucy, …how can I ever forget them… Many other cartoonists paid tribute to Peanuts and Schulz by homages in their own strips, appearing on February 13, 2000, or in

6160-437: The shape of an American football or rugby football . Most of the kids were initially fairly round-headed. As another example, all the characters (except Charlie Brown) had their mouths longer and had smaller eyes when they looked sideways. The 1960s is generally considered to be the "golden age" for Peanuts . During this period, some of the strip's best-known themes and characters appeared, including Peppermint Patty, Snoopy as

6248-404: The strip by extending his identity through various alter egos. Many of these alter egos, such as a "world-famous" attorney, surgeon or secret agent were seen only once or twice. His character is a mixture of innocence and egotism; he possesses childlike joy, while on occasion being somewhat selfish. He has an arrogant commitment to his independence but is often shown to be dependent on humans. Schulz

6336-614: The strip himself from the script to the finished art and lettering. Schulz did, however, hire help to produce the comic book adaptations of Peanuts . Thus, the strip was able to be presented with a unified tone, and Schulz was able to employ a minimalistic style. Backgrounds were generally not used, and when they were, Schulz's frazzled lines imbued them with a fraught, psychological appearance. This style has been described by art critic John Carlin as forcing "its readers to focus on subtle nuances rather than broad actions or sharp transitions." Schulz held this belief all his life, reaffirming in 1994

6424-540: The strip's run. For example Shermy , Patty and Violet were core characters during the initial years of the strip. By 1956, Patty and Violet's roles were described only as an extension to Lucy's, and Shermy, who was initially Charlie Brown's closest friend, was then described merely as "an extra little boy". In 1954, Schulz attempted to introduce Charlotte Braun, who was essentially a female version of Charlie Brown but with an excessively loud voice; poor reaction to her humorless personality led to Schulz " killing her off " in

6512-481: The strip. He offers opinions on topics such as literature, art, science, politics and theology . He possesses a sense of morality and ethical judgment that enables him to navigate topics such as faith, intolerance, and depression. Schulz enjoyed the adaptability of his character, remarking he can be "very smart" as well as "dumb". He has a tendency of expressing lofty or pompous ideas that are quickly rebuked. He finds psychological security from thumb sucking and holding

6600-437: The subtitles vanished as continuity strips gave way to humour strips. In a nod toward the classic daily strips of yesteryear, the cartoonist Bill Griffith continues the tradition by always centring a hand-lettered episode subtitle above each of his Zippy strips. In rare cases, some newspapers assembled pages of stacked strips minus titles, leaving more than a few confused readers. Early daily strips were large, often running

6688-417: The suggestion that the emotionally sensitive and depressed behavior of Charlie Brown drew from Schulz's own life or childhood experiences. Commenting on the tendency of these conclusions being drawn, Schulz said in a 1968 interview, "I think of myself as Charles Schulz. But if someone wants to believe I'm really Charlie Brown, well, it makes a good story." He explained in another interview that the comic strip as

6776-414: The telephone, who is apparently asking to speak to Snoopy. Charlie Brown responds by telling the caller "no, I think he’s writing". The second panel shows Snoopy sitting atop his doghouse typing on his typewriter as he had many times before, while the words "Dear Friends…" appeared above his head. The larger panel at the bottom consisted of a larger scale drawing of the final daily strip, with Snoopy against

6864-490: The time of Schulz's death in 2000, Peanuts ran in over 2,600 newspapers, with a readership of roughly 355 million across 75 countries, and had been translated into 21 languages. It helped to cement the four-panel gag strip as the standard in the United States, and together with its merchandise earned Schulz more than $ 1 billion. It got a movie adaptation in 2015 by Blue Sky Studios . Peanuts focuses on

6952-522: The title. Whenever Schulz was asked what he did for a living, he would evade mentioning the title and say, "I draw that comic strip with Snoopy in it, Charlie Brown and his dog". In 1997 Schulz said that he had discussed changing the title to Charlie Brown on multiple occasions in the past but found that it would ultimately cause problems with licensees who already incorporated the existing title into their products, with unnecessary expenses involved for all downstream licensees to change it. The strip began as

7040-404: The top to the bottom of the page. Some newspapers would alter a horizontal strip to fit their page layout by placing the first two panels of a strip atop panels three and four. This then had a shape roughly similar to a gag panel and could be grouped with the gag panels. The title of a strip was sometimes typeset and pasted into the first panel, enabling the strips to be closely stacked. This had

7128-481: The web, daily newspaper strips are usually in colour, and conversely, some Webcomics , such as Joyce and Walky , has been created in black and white. Traditionally, balloons and captions were hand-lettered with all upper case letters. However, there are exceptions such as a few strips which have typeset dialogue such as Barnaby . Upper and lower case lettering are used in Gasoline Alley . A distinction

7216-452: The week beforehand. The comic was reprinted the day after that, but only had the farewell letter. After Peanuts ended, United Feature Syndicate began offering the newspapers that ran it a package of reprinted strips under the title Classic Peanuts . The syndicate limited the choices to either strips from the 1960s or from the 1990s, although a newspaper was also given the option to carry both reprint packages if it desired. All Sunday strips in

7304-671: The years 1894 to 1996, has provided source material for books and articles by Blackbeard and other researchers. During the 1990s, this collection was acquired by the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum , providing the Ohio State museum with the world's most extensive collection of daily newspaper comic strip tear sheets and clippings. In 1998, six 18-wheelers transported the Blackbeard collection from California to Ohio. A Fortune poll in 1937 ranked

7392-431: Was careful in balancing Snoopy's life between that of a real dog and that of a fantastical character. While the interior of Snoopy's small doghouse is described in the strip as having such things as a library and a pool table and being adorned with paintings of Wyeth and Van Gogh , it was never shown: it would have demanded an inappropriate kind of suspension of disbelief from readers. Linus and Lucy are siblings; Linus

7480-415: Was declared second in a list of the "greatest comics of the 20th century" commissioned by The Comics Journal in 1999. The top-ranked comic was George Herriman 's Krazy Kat , a strip Schulz admired (and in fact was among his biggest inspirations), and he accepted the ranking in good grace, to the point of agreeing with it. In 2002 TV Guide declared Snoopy and Charlie Brown tied for 8th in its list of

7568-508: Was innovative in the 1950s. Its humor is psychologically complex and driven by the characters' interactions and relationships. The comic strip has been adapted in animation and theater. Schulz drew the strip for nearly 50 years, with no assistants, even in the lettering and coloring process. Peanuts was originally sold under the title of Li'l Folks , but that had been used before, so they said we have to think of another title. I couldn't think of one and somebody at United Features came up with

7656-615: Was practiced in the Journal of Occurrences , a series of newspaper articles published by an anonymous group of "patriots" in 1768–1769 in the New York Journal and Packet and other newspapers, chronicling the occupation of Boston by the British Army. According to historian Elmo Scott Watson , true print syndication began in 1841 with a two-page supplement produced by New York Sun publisher Moses Yale Beach and sold to

7744-447: Was the first dog ever to launch a human parodied the hype associated with Sputnik 2's launch of Laika the dog into space earlier that year. Another sequence lampooned Little Leagues and "organized" play when all the neighborhood kids join snowman -building leagues and criticize Charlie Brown when he insists on building his own snowmen without leagues or coaches. Peanuts touched on religious themes on many occasions, especially during

#681318