Charlie Brown’s Diamond Anniversary
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October 2, 1950, 75 years ago today, began what is inarguably one of the greatest comic strips of all time.
Charles M’ Schulz’s Peanuts is celebrating its 75th anniversary and some publications are taking notice.
How Charlie Brown Captured the American Psyche
Catharine Hughes at The New Statesman gives a brief history and social impact of the comic strip.
Peanuts was published in newspapers for the first time on 2 October 1950. By the mid-Sixties, it had tens of millions of daily readers, becoming the most widely read comic strip in the world, translated into more than 20 languages, reaching some 355 million readers in 75 countries. In Japan, Peanuts was taken so seriously that the official translator of the strip was also a Nobel Prize front-runner. Schulz was the first modern cartoonist to be given a retrospective in the Louvre.
Early ‘Peanuts’ characters would surprise you
Tom Emery at Shaw Local reminds us of a couple early characters that fell by the wayside.
The unparalleled success of “Peanuts,” though, did not include two of the primary characters from the 1950 debut of the strip. One of them, Shermy, delivered the punch line in the first installment on Oct. 2 after bragging up Charlie Brown to Patty, then saying, “Good ol’ Charlie Brown … how I hate him!”
The other original character, Patty, lasted until her final appearance on Nov. 27, 1997. She had the main scene in the second strip on Oct. 3, 1950, as she strolled down the sidewalk saying the familiar rhyme, “Little girls are made of sugar and spice and everything nice.”
Patty then hit Charlie Brown in the face, and followed with the punchline, “That’s what little girls are made of.”
As Peanuts turns 75, Charles Schulz’s comic is more poignant than ever
Anna Kaufman for USA Today and the entire Gannett group visits Jeannie Schulz and the Peanuts legacy.
SANTA ROSA, CA − Jeannie Schulz has a wicked sense of humor.
The 86-year-old widow of Charles Schulz, creator of Snoopy, Charlie Brown and the rest of the not-so-merry Peanuts gang, has become the conservator of his legacy.
Schulz is among the owners of Peanuts Worldwide, through which all partnerships flow − from Snoopy-stamped Uniqlo T-shirts to a new Apple TV+ special. She sits down with USA TODAY in an office at her husband’s eponymous museum, filled to the brim with Peanuts paraphernalia.
USA Today provides a Charles M. Schulz-Peanuts gallery to accompany their article.
And what better time for Apple TV+ to announce that their Peanuts contract has been extended.
Snoopy to stay with Apple TV+ until 2030
From William Gallagher at Apple Insider:
n 2019, Charles M. Shulz’s famous hound’s “Snoopy in Space” was among the earliest shows on Apple TV+. Then in 2020, the company signed a deal with rights holders Wildbrain and Peanuts Worldwide, to bring Snoopy, Charlie Brown, and the whole gang to screens in classics and new originals.
Now Apple TV+ has announced an extension of that deal in what is the Peanuts gang’s 75th year. The deal will see new shows — including a Charlie Brown movie currently in production — alongside all of the classics.
How ‘Peanuts’ — 75 years old this month — broke the rules
Jim Beckerman at the Bergen Record notes that Peanuts was not the usual kid comic strip.
Schulz didn’t establish much about his child characters in those first few strips. But he did establish one thing from the get-go. They were not Cute.
“There’s this emotional darkness that filters through the strips, right until the end,” said Chris Mautner, co-editor of The Comics Journal.
That darkness was what made the strip resonate — not just with children, not just with the rank-and-file newspaper readers who devoured “Nancy” and “Winnie Winkle,” but with college students, intellectuals, hippies.
That, and the fact that it was funny. “It’s that sweet and sour blend,” Mautner said.
Comic strip Peanuts notes 75th anniversary
For the Observer Chris LaGrow reminisces about Peanuts and has a different take.
Peanuts was a hilarious comic strip, and there are 60- and 70-year old strips that would make people laugh out loud even today. Lucy’s psychoanalysis of Charlie Brown, the conferences on the pitcher’s mound, Snoopy’s wild imagination, Peppermint Patty’s classroom struggles, new and better ways to agonizingly lose, are all relatable and very funny.
It was also subversive. Throughout its run, the strip showed girls playing baseball with boys, years before that became more commonplace. Characters quoted from scripture and classic novels and performed classical music.
Chris LaGrow also relates the origins of the Peanuts title:
Charles M. Schulz was a World War II veteran — and part of the D-Day landings — from St. Paul, Minn. After the war, this aspiring artist sold some single-panel comics to the Saturday Evening Post, and was soon pitching his strip (then billed as “L’il Folks”) to newspaper syndicates. Finally in 1950 United Features inked him, but because the L’il Folks name was similar to the already-popular L’il Abner strip, the syndicate [which distributed Li’l Abner] essentially forced the name “Peanuts” on him. Schulz hated the name (and always would), but he went along with it.
There had also been a “Little Folks” comic strip by Tack Knight that had been used recently enough so that the copyright to that title was still in effect.
Charles Schulz at 3 O’Clock in the morning: An excerpt from The Comics Journal #200 interview
The Comics Journal was mentioned above and they celebrate the Peanuts’ 75th anniversary by running a Charles Schulz profile and interview between Gary Groth and Sparky from 1997.
Prior to Peanuts, the province of the comic page was that of gags, social and political observation, domestic comedy, soap opera, various adventure genres. Although Peanuts has changed, or evolved, over the 47 years Schulz has written and drawn it, it remains, as it began, an anomaly on the comics page- a comic strip about the interior crises of the cartoonist himself.
It’s worth being reminded that Charles Schulz is one of the greatest cartoonists of the 20th century, something that the global phenomenon of Peanuts by way of all the merchandising and licensing and media spin-offs may obscure.
Bon anniversaire, Peanuts
And from France, for Peanuts is a worldwide phenomenon, is an appreciation by Vincent Baudoux (translated):
We must pay tribute to Schulz’s craftsmanship, to its craftsmanship through which an image drawn in about 20x20cm format remains perfectly readable in very small, or on the contrary in giant format. This possible variability in size is one of the data included from the outset. From the design on the drawing board, the draftsman takes into account future printing issues, on the best or worst of papers, this parameter being essential for images intended to be printed all over the world, on very different paper qualities, or on screens of all sizes.
Charles M. Schulz Museum, others celebrate ‘Peanuts’ 75th anniversary
At the Charles M. Schulz Museum’s hometown newspaper Charles Swanson for the Santa Rosa Press Democrat tells area residents and visitors how to celebrate Peanuts 75th anniversary.
At the epicenter of the “Peanuts” universe, Santa Rosa’s Charles M. Schulz Museum will host a “Celebrating 75 Years of Peanuts!” party on Saturday with several hands-on activities.
Visitors to the museum Thursday through Saturday will also receive a free mini poster commemorating the anniversary featuring Snoopy and Woodstock, while supplies last.
Another book hitting the shelves this month in honor of the strip’s 75th anniversary, “The Essential Peanuts by Charles M. Schulz,” sheds light on Schulz’s beloved art and the strip’s lasting cultural impact.
Later this month, independently owned local record stores across the country are holding listening parties featuring the music of Vince Guaraldi, an American jazz pianist best known for composing music for “Peanuts” animated specials.
Today, signs of Schulz’s work can be found throughout [Sonoma] county, including nearly 100 statues of his beloved “Peanuts” characters that can be found throughout the area with the help of an interactive digital map launched over the summer by Visit Santa Rosa — a program of the Santa Rosa Metro Chamber.
Good Grief! “Peanuts” Turns 75—Here’s How to Celebrate
Rachel DeSchepper at GoComics, the online home for the Peanuts comic strip. also has celebratory ideas.
… And now, 75 years later, “Peanuts” is still going strong, officially marking its milestone anniversary this Thursday, Oct. 2. You may have seen some of the celebrations throughout the year—corn mazes, limited-edition Snoopy merch, TikTok videos (that’s a cake a World War I flying ace would love!), even British stamps. But the pièce de résistance is the upcoming programming at the Charles M. Schulz Museum.
The museum, located in creator Charles M. Schulz’s longtime home of Santa Rosa, California, has two featured exhibitions: Memorable Moments: Celebrating 75 Years of Peanuts, which runs through Nov. 3, 2025, and HA! HA! HA! HA! 75 Years of Humor in Peanuts, which runs in the museum’s main gallery through March 18, 2026.
For details on all #Peanuts75 events, visit schulzmuseum.org/peanuts75. If you can’t make it to Santa Rosa, you can still join the celebration by following @schulzmuseum on social media and exploring their two online exhibitions: Celebrating Peanuts and Hidden Treasures.
Good ol’ Charlie Brown
Because there wasn’t enough of my favorite Peanuts character in the above…
Peanuts and the Peanuts characters © Peanuts Worldwide LLC.
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