Charlie Brown,Lucy,Linus,Sally,Peppermint Patty,Schroder,Snoopy,Woodstock,and the rest of the Peanuts gang debuted in newspapers across America.
In 1965, "A Charlie Brown Christmas" debuted as the first animated Peanuts TV special. This was followed by the debut of the Halloween special "It's The Great Pumpkin,Charlie Brown" in 1966 and "A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving" in 1973. Other holiday specials for Easter,New Year's,and Valentine's Day have followed. The Christmas special remains critically acclaimed and won the prestigious Peabody Award. One of the animated specials won an Emmy Award.
Charlie Brown and his Peanuts pals have always been a big part of my life and millions of lives around the world. Peanuts makes insightful observations about life from a child's point of view. No adults ever appeared in the comic strips. Only one animated special that I know about has adults shown at all. Most of the specials have adult voices muffled.
The success of "Peanuts" has led to full-length animated feature films and a Broadway musical, "You're A Good Man,Charlie Brown". The music from the cartoons, composed by Vince Guaraldi and performed by the Vince Guaraldi Trio, is enormously popular, especially from the Christmas special.
Charles Schulz died in 2000 after he specifically requested that "Peanuts" would no longer have first-run strips after his death. Yet, ten years after Mr.Schulz's death, his old Peanuts strips are rerun in newspapers every day and the animated specials are as popular as ever.
Happy 60th Anniversary,Charlie Brown. Thanks for being a part of my life and so many other lives.
Honorary mention goes to another favorite comic strip of mine, "Blondie",which turned 80 this year. Chic Young began drawing and syndicating "Blondie" in 1930. Chic Young died in 1973 and his son Dean took over as cartoonist. "Blondie" is as entertaining and popular as ever. Blondie has made its mark on American popular culture as well, popularizing a sandwich known as "The Dagwood", named after the huge,stacked sandwiches made by Dagwood in the Blondie comic strip. It is so refreshing that in a day and age of raw sex,gruesome violence,and hard profanity in movies,on TV,and elsewhere,that wholesome havens such as "Peanuts","Blondie",and "Snuffy Smith" remain intact.
Blondie was made into live action movies starring Penny Singleton as Blondie and Arthur Lake as Dagwood. It was also a TV sitcom in the 1950s and again in the 1960s,with an animated TV special in 1989,featuring the voice of Loni Anderson as Blondie. In 1991,after 61 years as a housewife, Blondie began her own catering business. Blondie and Dagwood have two children, son Alexander and daughter Cookie. Happy 80th Anniversary, Blondie,Dagwood,and the rest.
