Charlie Brown may look young. But the cartoon is now 75 years old! Good grief!
Charles Schulz created Charlie Brown. He did that for the comic Peanuts. His first strip came out on October 2, 1950. The dog Snoopy showed up two days later. Schulz then added other characters.
Schulz wrote 17,897 Peanuts comic strips. They reached more than 350 million readers. And Peanuts became part of culture.
Snoopy is a balloon in the Thanksgiving Day Parade. The U.S. Postal Service made Peanuts stamps. The TV special, A Charlie Brown Christmas, came out in 1965. There was a Broadway show. The Peanuts Movie came out in 2015. The “Snoopy In Style” show opened in 2025.
Schulz died on February 12, 2000. The final Peanuts strip printed one day later. What makes Peanuts still so popular? “ have passed down the love of the characters,” said Karen Johnson. She was once the director of the Charles M. Schulz Museum. Johnson said readers could with each character.
Charlie Brown is shy but full of hope. Linus is smart and carries a blanket. His sister, Lucy, is the bossy one. Schroeder loves the piano. And there is Charlie Brown’s pet beagle. “Snoopy ties them all together,” Johnson told News-O-Matic. “It’s easy to understand the love of a dog.”
Schulz came from Saint Paul, Minnesota. The mayor of the city made “Charles M. Schulz Day” in 2015. Mayor Chris Coleman said Schulz’s characters “are special to millions of people around the world.”
By Russell Kahn (Russ)
Updated October 1, 2025, 5:00 P.M. (ET)
