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160-464: The Far Side is a single-panel comic created by Gary Larson and syndicated by Chronicle Features and then Universal Press Syndicate , which ran from December 31, 1979, to January 1, 1995 (when Larson retired as a cartoonist). Its surrealistic humor is often based on uncomfortable social situations, improbable events, an anthropomorphic view of the world, logical fallacies, impending bizarre disasters, (often twisted) references to proverbs , or

320-404: A movie adaptation in 2015 by Blue Sky Studios . Peanuts focuses on 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

480-552: A syndicate hires people to write and draw a strip and then distributes it to many newspapers for a fee. Some newspaper strips begin or remain exclusive to one newspaper. For example, the Pogo comic strip by Walt Kelly originally appeared only in the New York Star in 1948 and was not picked up for syndication until the following year. Newspaper comic strips come in two different types: daily strips and Sunday strips . In

640-479: 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

800-428: A "standard" size", with strips running the entire width of a page or having more than one tier. By the 1920s, strips often covered six of the eight columns occupied by a traditional broadsheet paper. During the 1940s, strips were reduced to four columns wide (with a "transition" width of five columns). As newspapers became narrower beginning in the 1970s, strips have gotten even smaller, often being just three columns wide,

960-455: 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

1120-455: 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

1280-412: 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

1440-406: A child but never thought he would become a cartoonist; thus, he never studied art in school outside of required classes. Larson had been inspired to draw comics when he was younger from the strip Alley Oop , and later drew further inspiration from MAD Magazine and the work of Don Martin . He also enjoys comics from Gahan Wilson , B. Kliban and George Booth where humor was derived more from

1600-441: 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

1760-503: 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

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1920-442: 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

2080-587: A flock of geese (without anybody mourning their demise). Max and Moritz provided an inspiration for German immigrant Rudolph Dirks , who created the Katzenjammer Kids in 1897—a strip starring two German-American boys visually modelled on Max and Moritz . Familiar comic-strip iconography such as stars for pain, sawing logs for snoring, speech balloons, and thought balloons originated in Dirks' strip. Hugely popular, Katzenjammer Kids occasioned one of

2240-778: 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

2400-430: A full page, and daily strips were generally the width of the page. The competition between papers for having more cartoons than the rest from the mid-1920s, the growth of large-scale newspaper advertising during most of the thirties, paper rationing during World War II , the decline on news readership (as television newscasts began to be more common) and inflation (which has caused higher printing costs) beginning during

2560-399: 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

2720-564: A horse over a fire because they are "hungry enough to eat one" and a bird eating scrambled babies. Generally, they also avoided publishing cartoons with scatological humor; Larson recalled that during the strip's first few years he was not even allowed to draw an outhouse. Larson often disagreed with his editors' decisions and was sometimes successful in getting rejected cartoons published, although he does admit most of their decisions likely saved his career. Larson also says he never tried to intentionally offend readers. While Larson frequently used

2880-493: A letter informing him Nature's Way had been canceled because it generated too many complaints; he attributes this to the fact it ran next to a crossword puzzle aimed at children. Larson believes had this happened a week before, he would not have gone to San Francisco. The next day, Arnold called Larson and told him the syndicate affiliate of the Chronicle decided to syndicate his work. The affiliate, Chronicle Features, coined

3040-403: A letter that his work is too personal and important to him to have others "take control of it". For this reason, Universal's online service GoComics does not offer Far Side cartoons. In at least one case, he had sent out a cease and desist letter to a comics-aggregation site for reproducing The Far Side online. While an official Far Side site existed, it only offered information related to

3200-462: 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

3360-454: 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 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

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3520-494: A prehistoric lecturer refers to the then previously unnamed tail spikes of the Stegosaurus as the " thagomizer " because, according to the prehistoric lecturer, a caveman called Thag Simmons had been killed by those spikes.The arrangement of spikes originally had no distinct name, but Larson's neologism was adopted gradually by paleontologists, albeit only in a casual context. One of the most well known cartoons, School for

3680-555: A printed note from Schulz which officially announced his retirement from drawing and thanking his readers for their support. Although 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

3840-443: 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

4000-476: 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

4160-488: A secondary strip by the same artist as the main strip. No matter whether it appeared above or below a main strip, the extra strip was known as the topper , such as The Squirrel Cage which ran along with Room and Board , both drawn by Gene Ahern . During the 1930s, the original art for a Sunday strip was usually drawn quite large. For example, in 1930, Russ Westover drew his Tillie the Toiler Sunday page at

4320-484: A shirt featuring this cartoon go to the Jane Goodall Institute. Goodall wrote a preface to The Far Side Gallery 5 , detailing her version of the controversy, and the institute's letter was included next to the cartoon in the complete Far Side collection. She praised Larson's creative ideas, which often compare and contrast the behavior of humans and animals. In 1982, Larson published a comic in which

4480-480: 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

4640-493: A similar width to the one most daily panels occupied before the 1940s. In an issue related to size limitations, Sunday comics are often bound to rigid formats that allow their panels to be rearranged in several different ways while remaining readable. Such formats usually include throwaway panels at the beginning, which some newspapers will omit for space. As a result, cartoonists have less incentive to put great efforts into these panels. Garfield and Mutts were known during

4800-506: A single panel with a single gag, as seen occasionally in Mike Peters ' Mother Goose and Grimm . Early daily strips were large, often running the entire width of the newspaper, and were sometimes three or more inches high. 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 had a comics page on which many strips were collected together. During

4960-574: A size of 17" × 37". In 1937, the cartoonist Dudley Fisher launched the innovative Right Around Home , drawn as a huge single panel filling an entire Sunday page. Full-page strips were eventually replaced by strips half that size. Strips such as The Phantom and Terry and the Pirates began appearing in a format of two strips to a page in full-size newspapers, such as the New Orleans Times Picayune , or with one strip on

The Far Side - Misplaced Pages Continue

5120-472: 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

5280-637: A special exhibit of 527 black and white Far Side panels was shown in the Smithsonian Institution 's National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C. 127 of the panels were originals, displayed in the rotunda on boards that held 50 panels each. Later the display became a traveling exhibit that was shown in San Francisco , Washington, D.C., Orlando , Chicago , Toronto , New York City , Denver , and Los Angeles . There

5440-496: A tabloid page, as in the Chicago Sun-Times . When Sunday strips began to appear in more than one format, it became necessary for the cartoonist to allow for rearranged, cropped or dropped panels. During World War II , because of paper shortages, the size of Sunday strips began to shrink. After the war, strips continued to get smaller and smaller because of increased paper and printing costs. The last full-page comic strip

5600-426: 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

5760-584: 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

5920-554: A two-tier daily strip, Star Hawks , but after a few years, Star Hawks dropped down to a single tier. In Flanders , the two-tier strip is the standard publication style of most daily strips like Spike and Suzy and Nero . They appear Monday through Saturday; until 2003 there were no Sunday papers in Flanders. In the last decades, they have switched from black and white to color. Single panels usually, but not always, are not broken up and lack continuity. The daily Peanuts

6080-401: A week, which were sent to papers a few weeks in advance. By 1987, he was drawing seven cartoons a week. From October 1988 to January 1990, Larson took a hiatus from The Far Side to travel abroad and study jazz guitar with Jim Hall . When he resumed working on The Far Side in 1990, he negotiated an agreement in which he would only have to draw five cartoons a week. The final Far Side comic

6240-507: A wide range of colors. Printing plates were created with four or more colors—traditionally, the CMYK color model : cyan, magenta, yellow and "K" for black. With a screen of tiny dots on each printing plate, the dots allowed an image to be printed in a halftone that appears to the eye in different gradations. The semi-opaque property of ink allows halftone dots of different colors to create an optical effect of full-color imagery. The decade of

6400-443: 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

6560-473: 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

The Far Side - Misplaced Pages Continue

6720-424: Is a literate strip with philosophical, psychological, and sociological overtones, which 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

6880-418: Is a purely wholesome character. Snoopy 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

7040-508: Is a strip, and the daily Dennis the Menace is a single panel. J. R. Williams ' long-run Out Our Way continued as a daily panel even after it expanded into a Sunday strip, Out Our Way with the Willets . Jimmy Hatlo 's They'll Do It Every Time was often displayed in a two-panel format with the first panel showing some deceptive, pretentious, unwitting or scheming human behavior and

7200-440: Is able to use tools, including his typewriter. He introduces fantasy elements to 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

7360-614: Is also recurring in the strip; The Far Side was produced in a time when horror comedy was becoming popular. Recurring themes in The Far Side include people stranded on desert islands, aliens , Heaven , Hell , the life of cavemen , and medieval dungeons. Animals—especially cows —are also common. Larson focused on subjects he considered taboo because he wanted his cartoons to be personal statements. Larson's editors refused to publish strips they found indecent , offensive, or hard to understand. Examples include cowboys roasting

7520-509: 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",

7680-477: 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

7840-484: Is often shown to be dependent on humans. Schulz 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

8000-524: Is primarily told through the use of a single, vertical, rectangular panel , occasionally split into small sections of four, six, or eight for storytelling purposes. A caption or dialogue usually appears under the panel as typed text, although speech balloons are sometimes used for conversations. Certain strips, mostly those published on Sundays, are double-sized, colored, and have handwritten captions. When Larson drew panels they were 6 in × 7.5 in (15 cm × 19 cm), he penciled until

8160-549: 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

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8320-413: 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

8480-445: Is unrelated to creator Gary Larson) for The New Yorker , The Far Side ' s initial run came at a time where newspaper comics were generally more grounded, such as Peanuts , Garfield , For Better or For Worse and Doonesbury . The comic also helped introduce more modern and surreal humor into the comic pages that influence other strips such as Calvin and Hobbes and Bloom County ; it also has brought nerd humor to

8640-626: The Lansing State Journal in two sheets, printed much larger than the final version and ready to be cut apart and fitted into the local comics page." Comic strip historian Allan Holtz described how strips were provided as mats (the plastic or cardboard trays in which molten metal is poured to make plates) or even plates ready to be put directly on the printing press. He also notes that with electronic means of distribution becoming more prevalent printed sheets "are definitely on their way out." NEA Syndicate experimented briefly with

8800-932: 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

8960-657: The Flossy Frills series on The American Weekly Sunday newspaper supplement . In the UK and the rest of Europe, comic strips are also serialized in comic book magazines , with a strip's story sometimes continuing over three pages. Storytelling using a sequence of pictures has existed through history. One medieval European example in textile form is the Bayeux Tapestry . Printed examples emerged in 19th-century Germany and in mid 18th-century England, where some of

9120-549: The Internet . Many are exclusively published online, but the majority of traditional newspaper comic strips have some Internet presence. King Features Syndicate and other syndicates often provide archives of recent strips on their websites. Some, such as Scott Adams , creator of Dilbert , include an email address in each strip. Most comic strip characters do not age throughout the strip's life, but in some strips, like Lynn Johnston 's award-winning For Better or For Worse ,

9280-546: The editorial or op-ed page rather than the comics page because of their regular political commentary. For example, the August 12, 1974 Doonesbury strip was awarded a 1975 Pulitzer Prize for its depiction of the Watergate scandal . Dilbert is sometimes found in the business section of a newspaper instead of the comics page because of the strip's commentary about office politics , and Tank McNamara often appears on

9440-935: The miniatures written on scrolls coming out of their mouths—which makes them to some extent ancestors of the modern cartoon strips. In China, with its traditions of block printing and of the incorporation of text with image, experiments with what became lianhuanhua date back to 1884. The origin of the modern English language comic strip can be traced to the efflorescence of caricature in late 18th century London. English caricaturists such as Richard Newton and George Woodward developed sophisticated caricature styles using strips of expressive comic figures with captions that could be read left to right to cumulative effect, as well as business models for advertising and selling cheap comic illustration on regular subscription. Other leading British caricaturists produced strips as well; for example James Gillray in Democracy;-or-a Sketch of

9600-536: The newspaper war (1887 onwards) between Pulitzer and Hearst . The Little Bears (1893–96) was the first American comic strip with recurring characters, while the first color comic supplement was published by the Chicago Inter-Ocean sometime in the latter half of 1892, followed by the New York Journal ' s first color Sunday comic pages in 1897. On January 31, 1912, Hearst introduced

9760-409: 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

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9920-434: 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

10080-441: The 1920s the medium became wildly popular. While radio, and later, television surpassed newspapers as a means of entertainment, most comic strip characters were widely recognizable until the 1980s, and the "funny pages" were often arranged in a way they appeared at the front of Sunday editions. In 1931, George Gallup's first poll had the comic section as the most important part of the newspaper, with additional surveys pointing out that

10240-458: The 1930s, the original art for a daily strip could be drawn as large as 25 inches wide by six inches high. Over decades, the size of daily strips became smaller and smaller, until by 2000, four standard daily strips could fit in an area once occupied by a single daily strip. As strips have become smaller, the number of panels have been reduced. Proof sheets were the means by which syndicates provided newspapers with black-and-white line art for

10400-1055: The 1960s saw the rise of underground newspapers , which often carried comic strips, such as Fritz the Cat and The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers . Zippy the Pinhead initially appeared in underground publications in the 1970s before being syndicated. Bloom County and Doonesbury began as strips in college newspapers under different titles, and later moved to national syndication. Underground comic strips covered subjects that are usually taboo in newspaper strips, such as sex and drugs. Many underground artists, notably Vaughn Bode , Dan O'Neill , Gilbert Shelton , and Art Spiegelman went on to draw comic strips for magazines such as Playboy , National Lampoon , and Pete Millar's CARtoons . Jay Lynch graduated from undergrounds to alternative weekly newspapers to Mad and children's books. Webcomics , also known as online comics and internet comics , are comics that are available to read on

10560-565: 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

10720-413: The 1970s had been waning as an entertainment form. From 1903 to 1905 Gustave Verbeek , wrote his comic series "The UpsideDowns of Old Man Muffaroo and Little Lady Lovekins". These comics were made in such a way that one could read the 6 panel comic, flip the book and keep reading. He made 64 such comics in total. The longest-running American comic strips are: Most newspaper comic strips are syndicated;

10880-603: 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

11040-474: The 1997 Switcheroonie was a one-time publicity stunt, an artist taking over a feature from its originator is an old tradition in newspaper cartooning (as it is in the comic book industry). In fact, the practice has made possible the longevity of the genre's more popular strips. Examples include Little Orphan Annie (drawn and plotted by Harold Gray from 1924 to 1944 and thereafter by a succession of artists including Leonard Starr and Andrew Pepoy ), and Terry and

11200-481: The British magazine Judy by writer and fledgling artist Charles H. Ross in 1867, Ally Sloper is one of the earliest comic strip characters and he is regarded as the first recurring character in comics. The highly popular character was spun off into his own comic, Ally Sloper's Half Holiday , in 1884. While in the early 20th century comic strips were a frequent target for detractors of "yellow journalism", by

11360-524: The Gifted consists of a child trying to enter a schoolhouse by pushing the door when it clearly says "pull". The Complete Far Side and The Prehistory of The Far Side include letters from angry readers alongside the comics that prompted them. The letters were written to newspaper publishers and often demanded the removal of The Far Side . Despite these protests, The Far Side remained popular and continued to run in many newspapers. Larson often laughs at

11520-804: The Life of Buonaparte . His contemporary Thomas Rowlandson used strips as early as 1784 for example in The Loves of the Fox and the Badger . Rowlandson may also be credited with inventing the first internationally recognized comic strip character: Doctor Syntax whose picaresque journeys through England were told through a series of comic etchings, accompanied by verse. Original published in parts between 1809 and 1811 in Rudolf Ackermann 's Poetical Magazine , in book form The Tour of Doctor Syntax in search of

11680-859: The NCS, enthusiastically promote the medium, which since the 1970s (and particularly the 1990s) has been considered to be in decline due to numerous factors such as changing tastes in humor and entertainment, the waning relevance of newspapers in general and the loss of most foreign markets outside English-speaking countries. One particularly humorous example of such promotional efforts is the Great Comic Strip Switcheroonie , held in 1997 on April Fool's Day, an event in which dozens of prominent artists took over each other's strips. Garfield ' s Jim Davis, for example, switched with Blondie ' s Stan Drake, while Scott Adams ( Dilbert ) traded strips with Bil Keane ( The Family Circus ). While

11840-402: The Pirates . In the 1940s, soap-opera -continuity strips such as Judge Parker and Mary Worth gained popularity. Because "comic" strips are not always funny, cartoonist Will Eisner has suggested that sequential art would be a better genre -neutral name. Comic strips have appeared inside American magazines such as Liberty and Boys' Life , but also on the front covers, such as

12000-490: The Pirates , started by Milton Caniff in 1934 and picked up by George Wunder . A business-driven variation has sometimes led to the same feature continuing under a different name. In one case, in the early 1940s, Don Flowers ' Modest Maidens was so admired by William Randolph Hearst that he lured Flowers away from the Associated Press and to King Features Syndicate by doubling the cartoonist's salary, and renamed

12160-490: The United States, a daily strip appears in newspapers on weekdays, Monday through Saturday, as contrasted with a Sunday strip, which typically only appears on Sundays. Daily strips usually are printed in black and white, and Sunday strips are usually in color. However, a few newspapers have published daily strips in color, and some newspapers have published Sunday strips in black and white. Making his first appearance in

12320-561: The World ), some have verbal thoughts but are not understood by humans, ( Garfield , Snoopy in Peanuts ), and some can converse with humans ( Bloom County , Calvin and Hobbes , Mutts , Citizen Dog , Buckles , Get Fuzzy , Pearls Before Swine , and Pooch Cafe ). Other strips are centered entirely on animals, as in Pogo and Donald Duck . Gary Larson 's The Far Side

12480-486: 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

12640-685: 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.)" The two conventional formats for newspaper comics are strips and single gag panels. The strips are usually displayed horizontally, wider than they are tall. Single panels are square, circular or taller than they are wide. Strips usually, but not always, are broken up into several smaller panels with continuity from panel to panel. A horizontal strip can also be used for

12800-475: The air and boasted that he 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

12960-468: The cartoon shared similarities to Peanuts . The name "Charlie Brown" was first used there. The series also had a dog that looked much like 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

13120-415: The cartoon's caption "Cow tools". While most of the displayed tools had no apparent function, one was similar to a saw. The cartoon has been described as "arguably the most loathed" Far Side strip, with Reddit posters calling it the series' "notoriously confusing cartoon". Larson was frequently asked about the meaning of the cartoon by the media, and received numerous letters, some angry and questioning where

13280-623: The characters age as the years pass. The first strip to feature aging characters was Gasoline Alley . The history of comic strips also includes series that are not humorous, but tell an ongoing dramatic story. Examples include The Phantom , Prince Valiant , Dick Tracy , Mary Worth , Modesty Blaise , Little Orphan Annie , Flash Gordon , and Tarzan . Sometimes these are spin-offs from comic books , for example Superman , Batman , and The Amazing Spider-Man . A number of strips have featured animals as main characters. Some are non-verbal ( Marmaduke , The Angriest Dog in

13440-466: The characters. Hearst promptly hired Harold Knerr to draw his own version of the strip. Dirks renamed his version Hans and Fritz (later, The Captain and the Kids ). Thus, two versions distributed by rival syndicates graced the comics pages for decades. Dirks' version, eventually distributed by United Feature Syndicate , ran until 1979. In the United States, the great popularity of comics sprang from

13600-528: The comic and published books, but did not offer any of the strips. In 2003, Gary Larson drew a cover for the November 17 edition of The New Yorker magazine (the Cartoon Issue), a prestigious offer he said he could not refuse. On September 13, 2019, the official Far Side site was updated with a major redesign, teasing that "[a] new online era of The Far Side " would be forthcoming. The full site

13760-412: The comic strip as 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

13920-594: The comic strips were the second most popular feature after the picture page. During the 1930s, many comic sections had between 12 and 16 pages, although in some cases, these had up to 24 pages. The popularity and accessibility of strips meant they were often clipped and saved; authors including John Updike and Ray Bradbury have written about their childhood collections of clipped strips. Often posted on bulletin boards , clipped strips had an ancillary form of distribution when they were faxed, photocopied or mailed. The Baltimore Sun ' s Linda White recalled, "I followed

14080-598: The comic's official website. Larson was recognized for his work on the strip with the National Cartoonist Society Newspaper Panel Cartoon Award for 1985 and 1988, and with their Reuben Award for 1990 and 1994. The Far Side won the 2020 Webby People's Voice Award for Humor in the category Web. The Far Side was created by Gary Larson , a cartoonist based in Seattle , Washington . Larson enjoyed drawing as

14240-406: The comics' composition than dialogue, which Larson considered "something almost organic going on between the humor and the art that conveyed it". In 1976, Larson was working as a cashier at a retail music store when he realized how much he hated his job. Two days into this "career crisis", Larson sat down at his kitchen table and drew six cartoons. The next day, he showed the cartoons to an editor at

14400-502: 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

14560-472: The controversies as evidenced in The Prehistory of The Far Side , in which he writes that the people complaining have usually misunderstood the cartoon. There are 23 collected editions of The Far Side , which combined have sold over 45 million copies and have generated US$ 70 million in revenue. The books are published by Andrews McMeel Publishing , an affiliate of Universal. Andrews McMeel acquired

14720-424: 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 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

14880-420: 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,

15040-603: The encouragement of his girlfriend. In what he called a "daring plan to expand this 'publication empire'", Larson left a portfolio with his work at the headquarters of the San Francisco Chronicle . After several days, Larson was informed that editor Stan Arnold wanted to speak with him. Arnold was impressed by his work and mentioned that, should the Chronicle be interested in Larson's work, it could become syndicated . When Larson returned to Seattle, he received

15200-601: 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

15360-525: The feature Glamor Girls to avoid legal action by the AP. The latter continued to publish Modest Maidens , drawn by Jay Allen in Flowers' style. As newspapers have declined , the changes have affected comic strips. Jeff Reece, lifestyle editor of The Florida Times-Union , wrote, "Comics are sort of the ' third rail ' of the newspaper." In the early decades of the 20th century, all Sunday comics received

15520-402: The fifties and sixties led to Sunday strips being published on smaller and more diverse formats. As newspapers have reduced the page count of Sunday comic sections since the late 1990s (by the 2010s, most sections have only four pages, with the back page not always being destined for comics) has also led to further downsizes. Daily strips have suffered as well. Before the mid-1910s, there was not

15680-417: 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, 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

15840-817: 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

16000-468: The first satirical or humorous sequential narrative drawings were produced. William Hogarth 's 18th-century English caricature include both narrative sequences, such as A Rake's Progress , and single panels. The Biblia pauperum ("Paupers' Bible"), a tradition of picture Bibles beginning in the Late Middle Ages , sometimes depicted Biblical events with words spoken by the figures in

16160-400: The first comic-strip copyright ownership suits in the history of the medium. When Dirks left William Randolph Hearst for the promise of a better salary under Joseph Pulitzer , it was an unusual move, since cartoonists regularly deserted Pulitzer for Hearst. In a highly unusual court decision, Hearst retained the rights to the name "Katzenjammer Kids", while creator Dirks retained the rights to

16320-632: The forefront, reflected in series like The Simpsons . Comic strip Most strips are written and drawn by a comics artist, known as a cartoonist . As the word "comic" implies, strips are frequently humorous. Examples of these gag-a-day strips are Blondie , Bringing Up Father , Marmaduke , and Pearls Before Swine . In the late 1920s, comic strips expanded from their mirthful origins to feature adventure stories , as seen in Popeye , Captain Easy , Buck Rogers , Tarzan , and Terry and

16480-427: 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

16640-571: The history of London. The Reuben , named for cartoonist Rube Goldberg , is the most prestigious award for U.S. comic strip artists. Reuben awards are presented annually by the National Cartoonists Society (NCS). In 1995, the United States Postal Service issued a series of commemorative stamps, Comic Strip Classics , marking the comic-strip centennial. Today's strip artists, with the help of

16800-495: 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 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

16960-593: The humor of the strip. In his first month of syndication, Larson made about US$ 100. The contract with Chronicle lasted four years. After it expired, Universal Press Syndicate picked up the syndication rights. The Far Side made its debut in the January 1, 1980, edition of the Chronicle , and a few months later, Chronicle Features began to offer it to other papers. While it was only in four papers by 1982, by 1983 that number had increased to eighty, and by 1985 it had reached two hundred. Initially, Larson drew six cartoons

17120-594: The humor was in the comic. Larson said in Prehistory of the Far Side that he had so much mail from this strip he had to issue a press release to explain that there was nothing to explain about the Cow Tools comic. One The Far Side cartoon shows two chimpanzees grooming. One finds a blonde human hair on the other and inquires, "Conducting a little more 'research' with that Jane Goodall tramp?" Goodall herself

17280-491: The image "closely approximate[d]" his vision, and then he would ink it. The caption was handwritten in pencil underneath the cartoon. When Universal received a cartoon, it would set the caption to the usual typeface and add copyright and publication dates. The series is characterized by its unconventional, often surrealistic , style of humor. Brigham Young University professor Kerry Soper described it as "an anomaly" among other newspaper cartoons and ComicsAlliance wrote it

17440-404: 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

17600-401: The late 1960s, it became a mouthpiece for Capp's repudiation of the counterculture. Pogo used animals to particularly devastating effect, caricaturing many prominent politicians of the day as animal denizens of Pogo's Okeefenokee Swamp. In a fearless move, Pogo's creator Walt Kelly took on Joseph McCarthy in the 1950s, caricaturing him as a bobcat named Simple J. Malarkey, a megalomaniac who

17760-403: The late 19th century. The Yellow Kid is usually credited as one of the first newspaper strips . However, the art form combining words and pictures developed gradually and there are many examples which led up to the comic strip. The Glasgow Looking Glass was the first mass-produced publication to tell stories using illustrations and is regarded as the world's first comic strip. It satirised

17920-466: 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

18080-458: 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

18240-421: The local magazine Pacific Search . The editor was impressed and paid him US$ 90, so Larson quit his job to start cartooning and created Nature's Way , a single-panel comic strip that served as the basis for The Far Side . Larson showed Nature's Way to the editor of the weekly newspaper Summer News Review , who began to publish it on a regular basis. Although Larson was initially excited to be published, he

18400-505: The members with his drawings and the force of his personality. The comic strip was safe for satire. During the early 20th century, comic strips were widely associated with publisher William Randolph Hearst , whose papers had the largest circulation of strips in the United States. Hearst was notorious for his practice of yellow journalism , and he was frowned on by readers of The New York Times and other newspapers which featured few or no comic strips. Hearst's critics often assumed that all

18560-423: The mid-to-late 80s and 1990s respectively for their throwaways on their Sunday strips, however both strips now run "generic" title panels. Peanuts 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

18720-499: The name The Far Side ; Larson joked Chronicle "could have called it ' Revenge of the Zucchini People ' for all I cared." Larson's initial contract for The Far Side called for it to have a cast of recurring characters (like how Peanuts had Charlie Brown ), because Chronicle believed newspaper comics needed familiar characters to be successful. However, Larson disagreed, feeling it would be limiting and diminish

18880-462: The nation's first full daily comic page in his New York Evening Journal . The history of this newspaper rivalry and the rapid appearance of comic strips in most major American newspapers is discussed by Ian Gordon . Numerous events in newspaper comic strips have reverberated throughout society at large, though few of these events occurred in recent years, owing mainly to the declining use of continuous storylines on newspaper comic strips, which since

19040-477: The official site. Larson said that while he does not plan to draw regular Far Side comics, he may include new material every once in a while when updating the site. On July 7, 2020, Larson released new Far Side strips for the first time in 25 years on the website. Unlike his previous work with pen and paper, Larson transitioned to using a graphics tablet for the comic. In an accompanying post, Larson explained that frustration with his pens clogging from disuse on

19200-470: 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

19360-408: 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 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

19520-685: The picturesque ran to 9 editions between 1812 and 1819, spun off two sequels, a prequel, numerous pirate imitations and copies including French, German, Danish and translations. His image was available on pottery, textiles wallpaper and other merchandise. The Caricature Magazine or Hudibrastic Mirror , an influential English comic series published in London between 1807 and 1819 by Thomas Tegg included some satirical stories in comic strip format such as The Adventures of Johnny Newcome . The first newspaper comic strips appeared in North America in

19680-615: The political and social life of Scotland in the 1820s. It was conceived and illustrated by William Heath. Swiss author and caricature artist Rodolphe Töpffer (Geneva, 1799–1846) is considered the father of the modern comic strips. His illustrated stories such as Histoire de Mr. Vieux Bois (1827), first published in the US in 1842 as The Adventures of Obadiah Oldbuck or Histoire de Monsieur Jabot (1831), inspired subsequent generations of German and American comic artists. In 1865, German painter, author, and caricaturist Wilhelm Busch created

19840-459: 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

20000-661: 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 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

20160-497: The rare occasions when he drew following his retirement (primarily for his annual Christmas card) led him to try working on a digital tablet. The new freedom and possibilities offered by the digital medium meant that he soon found he "was having fun drawing again". Larson made it clear that he was not resuming production of a daily cartoon, but was "exploring, experimenting and trying stuff." As of March 30, 2024, Larson has not uploaded any new work since December 7, 2023. The Far Side

20320-439: The reproduction of strips (which they arranged to have colored in the case of Sunday strips). Michigan State University Comic Art Collection librarian Randy Scott describes these as "large sheets of paper on which newspaper comics have traditionally been distributed to subscribing newspapers. Typically each sheet will have either six daily strips of a given title or one Sunday strip. Thus, a week of Beetle Bailey would arrive at

20480-457: The rights to publish collected editions of the series in 1982, the year the first Far Side book was released. It was surprisingly successful, which influenced Larson's decision to sign on with Universal after his contract with Chronicle expired. In January 1985, the four Far Side books out at the time— The Far Side , The Far Side Gallery , Beyond the Far Side and In Search of the Far Side —were simultaneous bestsellers; Jim Davis 's Garfield

20640-423: The same stereotypical characters (such as a woman with a beehive hairdo ), he purposely did not name his characters nor imply they were the same characters from cartoon to cartoon. He did not want to have a character-based series, as the characters were there to help serve the humor of the comic. Cow Tools is the name of a 1982 Far Side cartoon. It shows a cow standing behind a table with strange objects, with

20800-504: 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

20960-518: The search for meaning in life. Larson's frequent use of animals and nature in the comic is popularly attributed to his background in biology . The Far Side was ultimately carried by more than 1,900 daily newspapers, translated into 17 languages, and collected into calendars, greeting cards, and 23 compilation books, and reruns are still carried in many newspapers. After a 25-year hiatus, in July 2020, Larson began drawing new Far Side strips offered through

21120-413: The second panel revealing the truth of the situation. Sunday newspapers traditionally included a special color section. Early Sunday strips (known colloquially as "the funny papers", shortened to "the funnies"), such as Thimble Theatre and Little Orphan Annie , filled an entire newspaper page, a format known to collectors as full page . Sunday pages during the 1930s and into the 1940s often carried

21280-439: 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

21440-504: The sports page because of its subject matter. Lynn Johnston 's For Better or For Worse created an uproar when Lawrence, one of the strip's supporting characters, came out of the closet. The world's longest comic strip is 88.9-metre (292 ft) long and on display at Trafalgar Square as part of the London Comedy Festival. The London Cartoon Strip was created by 15 of Britain's best known cartoonists and depicts

21600-468: The strip Max and Moritz , about two trouble-making boys, which had a direct influence on the American comic strip. Max and Moritz was a series of seven severely moralistic tales in the vein of German children's stories such as Struwwelpeter ("Shockheaded Peter"). In the story's final act, the boys, after perpetrating some mischief, are tossed into a sack of grain, run through a mill, and consumed by

21760-616: 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

21920-544: 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

22080-483: 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

22240-451: The strips in his papers were fronts for his own political and social views. Hearst did occasionally work with or pitch ideas to cartoonists, most notably his continued support of George Herriman 's Krazy Kat . An inspiration for Bill Watterson and other cartoonists, Krazy Kat gained a considerable following among intellectuals during the 1920s and 1930s. Some comic strips, such as Doonesbury and Mallard Fillmore , may be printed on

22400-402: 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

22560-414: 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

22720-456: The time of its conclusion, the series was carried in more than 1,900 papers and translated into 17 languages. Universal briefly re-syndicated The Far Side for a three-month period in late 2003 to promote the release of the anthology The Complete Far Side: 1980–1994 , and many newspapers still publish reprints. Larson has expressed disapproval of the distribution of his cartoons on the internet and has requested that fans do not do so; he wrote in

22880-521: The time was the most expensive New York Times bestseller . A new, lighter edition of The Complete Far Side was released in 2014. A large amount of Far Side merchandise was produced, ranging from greeting cards , posters , t-shirts , and mugs . For many years, Larson produced a yearly calendar that contained a Far Side cartoon for each day of the year. He stopped making them annually in 2002, but created another edition in 2006; all proceeds from this edition went to Conservation International . In

23040-436: 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 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

23200-492: 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 a daily strip on October 2, 1950, in seven newspapers: the Minneapolis Star , a hometown newspaper of Schulz (page 37, along with

23360-403: The two-volume, twenty-pound anthology The Complete Far Side: 1980—1994 . The Complete Far Side contains every Far Side cartoon syndicated and, when it was initially published, retailed for US$ 135. Larson spent three years working on it; the majority of work went into redrawing characters' eyeballs because he was unhappy how they looked when transferred digitally. It sold 350,000 copies and at

23520-505: The way for some of these strips, as its human characters were manifest in diverse forms—as animals, vegetables, and minerals. The comics have long held a distorted mirror to contemporary society, and almost from the beginning have been used for political or social commentary. This ranged from the conservative slant of Harold Gray's Little Orphan Annie to the unabashed liberalism of Garry Trudeau's Doonesbury . Al Capp's Li'l Abner espoused liberal opinions for most of its run, but by

23680-453: 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

23840-399: The years they were available, Far Side greeting cards and calendars sold 110 million and 45 million copies, respectively. Larson stated in 1987 he was personally embarrassed by how much money he made from Far Side merchandise. In 1994, Larson produced an animated special, Tales from the Far Side , featuring his art style and gags from the strips. He produced a sequel in 1997. In 1987,

24000-453: Was "surreal, random, and occasionally very dark". Larson was influenced by his family's "morbid" sense of humor. His older brother Dan, who would often play pranks on him that took advantage of his fears, was a particular influence. He also drew inspiration from personal experience, Mad , and his favorite childhood book, Mr. Bear Squash-You-All-Flat . Larson sought to mock the human condition , often by placing animals in human positions. Fear

24160-479: Was a Far Side gallery at the California Academy of Science that featured some of Larson's panels. The exhibit included a giant microscope under which visitors could stand, based on one of Larson's cartoons. Looking up through the objective lens revealed a giant blinking eyeball. The building was torn down and replaced and the exhibit is no longer in the new facility. As described by Sarah Larson (who

24320-525: Was bent on taking over the characters' birdwatching club and rooting out all undesirables. Kelly also defended the medium against possible government regulation in the McCarthy era . At a time when comic books were coming under fire for supposed sexual, violent, and subversive content, Kelly feared the same would happen to comic strips. Going before the Congressional subcommittee, he proceeded to charm

24480-418: 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

24640-622: Was in Africa at the time, and the Jane Goodall Institute felt the cartoon was in bad taste; the organization had its lawyers draft a letter to Larson and his distribution syndicate, in which the cartoon was labeled an "atrocity." These efforts were stymied by Goodall herself when she returned and saw the cartoon and stated that she found it amusing, commenting "It all helps to put us humans in our place, and we desperately need putting in our place." Since then, all profits from sales of

24800-410: Was launched on December 17, 2019. It features a "daily dose" of several randomly selected Far Side comics, a weekly themed collection, and additional material including art from Larson's sketchbooks. Larson wrote in an open letter announcing the site that he hoped that the official online presence of The Far Side would encourage sites presently hosting his comics to take them down and direct readers to

24960-576: Was only paid US$ 3 a cartoon. Eventually, he stopped and became an investigator for the local humane society . In 1979, a reporter for the Seattle Times who had met Larson while investigating "pony abuse" showed Nature's Way to her editor. It was revived and began appearing in the Saturday edition of the paper. Larson was paid US$ 15 a cartoon. After about a year, Larson took a vacation from his humane society work to drive to San Francisco at

25120-469: Was run in newspapers on January 1, 1995. Larson wrote a letter to his followers in October 1994 that explained he was ending the series due to "simple fatigue" and avoid having The Far Side fall into the "Graveyard of Mediocre Cartoons" if he continued. Larson also later stated he wanted to pursue a career as a jazz guitarist. During its 15-year run, Larson produced a total of 4,337 Far Side cartoons. By

25280-669: Was the Prince Valiant strip for 11 April 1971. Comic strips have also been published in Sunday newspaper magazines. Russell Patterson and Carolyn Wells' New Adventures of Flossy Frills was a continuing strip series seen on Sunday magazine covers. Beginning January 26, 1941, it ran on the front covers of Hearst's American Weekly newspaper magazine supplement, continuing until March 30 of that year. Between 1939 and 1943, four different stories featuring Flossy appeared on American Weekly covers. Sunday comics sections employed offset color printing with multiple print runs imitating

25440-544: Was the only newspaper comic that had previously accomplished this feat. New Far Side books continued to be published after the series concluded and remain in print and popular today. During his 14-month hiatus, Larson produced The PreHistory of The Far Side: A 10th Anniversary Exhibit , a Far Side anthology that commemorates the series' 10th anniversary. It contains commentary on individual strips, letters from angry readers, unpublished cartoons, and some of Larson's personal favorite Far Side s. In 2003, Andrews McMeel released

25600-561: Was unusual, as there were no central characters. Instead The Far Side used a wide variety of characters including humans, monsters, aliens , chickens, cows, worms , amoebas , and more. John McPherson's Close to Home also uses this theme, though the characters are mostly restricted to humans and real-life situations. Wiley Miller not only mixes human, animal, and fantasy characters, but also does several different comic strip continuities under one umbrella title, Non Sequitur . Bob Thaves 's Frank & Ernest began in 1972 and paved

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