On 2 October 1950, something very small appeared in seven American newspapers. It was only four panels long. The drawings were simple. The characters were children. The jokes were quiet rather than spectacular. There were no superheroes, no explosions and no elaborate adventures. And yet, that little comic strip would go on to become one of the most famous and influential cartoons in the world. This is the story of Peanuts and Charles M. Shultz.
Charles M. Schulz was a cartoonist who had dreamed of becoming a professional artist since childhood. The four panelled strip introduced readers to characters who would eventually become household names: Charlie Brown, Snoopy, Patty and Shermy, along with many other characters who would join the cast over the following years.
Today, Peanuts is known all over the world. But its beginnings were surprisingly modest.
So how did a young cartoonist from Minnesota turn a simple comic strip about children into a cultural phenomenon?
And what can the story of Charlie Brown teach us about the history of cartoons, perseverance, creativity and even the importance of failure?
We’ve done another cartoon study of Winsor McCay if you’d like to take a look:
The Story of Peanuts and Charles M. Schulz
What Happened in 1950?
The year 1950 was an important one in the history of newspaper comics.
On 2 October 1950, the first Peanuts comic strip appeared in seven newspapers across the United States.
The newspapers were:
- The Washington Post
- The Chicago Tribune
- The Minneapolis Star-Tribune
- The Allentown Call-Chronicle
- The Bethlehem Globe-Times
- The Denver Post
- The Seattle Times
The strip was published in a simple four-panel format.
Charles M. Schulz was 27 years old.
He had finally achieved something he had wanted for years: he was a professional newspaper cartoonist.
But there was an interesting problem.
The cartoon wasn’t originally supposed to be called Peanuts.
From Li’l Folks to Peanuts
Before the story of Peanuts existed, Schulz had created a comic called Li’l Folks.
The title reflected that the cartoons were about little people, particularly children, doing things that seemed surprisingly grown-up.
Schulz had been drawing Li’l Folks for the St. Paul Pioneer Press from 1947. The cartoons featured children with relatively large heads and distinctive personalities. Schulz was already experimenting with the idea that children could express complicated thoughts and feelings in funny ways. This was important because Schulz wasn’t simply interested in making people laugh.
He was interested in people.
Why do we feel embarrassed or worry about what other people think?
Why do we sometimes feel left out, and be confident one moment and uncertain the next?
And why can a tiny disappointment feel like a disaster when you are a child?
These questions would eventually become central to Peanuts.
But there was a problem with the name.
When Schulz sold the strip to United Feature Syndicate, there was concern that Li’l Folks was too similar to another cartoon called Little Folks, created by Tack Knight.
So the syndicate decided that Schulz’s new comic needed another name.
They chose:
Peanuts
Schulz didn’t like the name.
In fact, he disliked it so much that he continued to complain about it for decades!
He had suggested names such as Charlie Brown or Good Ol’ Charlie Brown, but the syndicate chose Peanuts instead. It is rather amusing to imagine what might have happened if the syndicate had listened to him.
Would we now be talking about the story of Charlie Brown instead of the story of Peanuts?
Would people around the world know the phrase ‘Peanuts gang’?
Perhaps!
Who Was Charles M. Schulz?
Charles Monroe Schulz was born on 26 November 1922 in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
He was the only child of Carl and Dena Schulz.
His father was a barber, and the family lived a fairly ordinary life.
But from a young age, Schulz loved to draw.
And he particularly loved cartoons.
He dreamed of becoming a professional cartoonist.
This is an important part of his story because Schulz did not suddenly wake up one morning and become a famous artist.
He spent years learning, practising and being rejected.
After finishing school, he studied through the correspondence school Art Instruction, Inc., and he later worked there as an instructor. He also submitted cartoons to magazines and newspapers, gradually building experience.
His path to becoming a successful cartoonist was not easy.
That makes his story particularly valuable for children studying creativity.
Sometimes becoming good at something means doing the same thing over and over again even when nobody seems to notice.
Before the Story of Peanuts: Charles Schulz and the Second World War
Schulz’s life was also shaped by the Second World War.
In 1943, he was drafted into the United States Army.
He served in Europe as a machine-gun squad leader and experienced the enormous upheaval of wartime.
The experience of being away from home, dealing with loneliness and facing uncertainty would become part of the emotional world that Schulz later brought to his cartoons.
This is one reason Peanuts can sometimes feel surprisingly thoughtful.
The strip is funny, but it is not always cheerful.
Its characters worry.
They fail, get embarrassed, are disappointed, and feel lonely.
They don’t always understand one another.
And yet they keep going.
That combination of humour and vulnerability became one of Schulz’s greatest strengths.
Charlie Brown Wasn’t Quite the Charlie Brown We Know
When Peanuts first appeared in 1950, Charlie Brown looked and behaved somewhat differently from the character we would eventually come to know.
Early Charlie Brown was more confident and sometimes rather cheeky.
He did not yet have his famous yellow shirt with the black zig-zag.
Even Snoopy looked different.
In the earliest strips, Snoopy was a much more ordinary-looking dog who walked on four legs. His extraordinary imagination and elaborate alter egos developed later.
This gives us a wonderful opportunity to teach children about artistic development.
Artists don’t always know exactly what a character will become when they first draw them.
Characters can evolve.
Their appearance can change.
Their personalities can develop.
And sometimes an artist discovers what works best simply by continuing to draw.
So, Who Was Charlie Brown in the Story of Peanuts?
Charlie Brown became the central character of Peanuts. The Story of Peanuts was, in fact, the Story of Charlie Brown.
He is often described as an everyman character, someone whose experiences are ordinary enough that many different people can recognise themselves in him.
Charlie Brown wants things to go well.
Unfortunately, they frequently don’t!
He worries about what other people think, tries hard, and sometimes fails.
He gets discouraged and experiences disappointment.
And yet he keeps trying.
This is one of the reasons the story of Peanuts, aka Charlie Brown, became so beloved.
He isn’t a perfect hero.
In fact, he is often the opposite.
He is the child who doesn’t quite know what to say.
The child who isn’t sure where he belongs.
The child who tries to kick the football even though Lucy may pull it away again.
And he is the child who wonders why things don’t seem to work out for him.
It is this that makes him remarkably human.
The Children in the Story of Peanuts Are Surprisingly Grown-Up
One of Schulz’s most interesting ideas was to allow children to discuss things they really do think about, often in surprisingly sophisticated language.
The characters worry about:
- friendship
- loneliness
- school
- confidence
- failure
- jealousy
- popularity
- disappointment
- love
- purpose
- success
- insecurity
They may be small children, but their emotional lives are enormous.
This was one of Schulz’s great innovations.
Instead of making children merely silly side characters, he treated their thoughts and feelings seriously.
The result was a comic strip that could make children laugh while also making adults recognise themselves.
Meet the Peanuts Gang
Although Charlie Brown is at the centre of the strip, the world of Peanuts became much richer as new characters appeared.
Snoopy
Charlie Brown’s dog began as a relatively ordinary beagle but gradually developed an extraordinary imagination.
Snoopy could become almost anyone he imagined himself to be.
He might be:
- a World War I flying ace
- writer
- lawyer
- detective
- famous author
- or simply a dog lying on top of his kennel!
Snoopy’s imagination became one of the most recognisable features of Peanuts.
Lucy
Lucy van Pelt is confident, outspoken and often bossy.
She frequently gives advice whether anyone has asked for it or not!
She became one of Schulz’s most memorable characters because of her strong personality and her ability to say exactly what she thinks.
Linus
Linus is Lucy’s younger brother.
He is thoughtful, philosophical and often surprisingly wise.
He is also famous for carrying his security blanket.
The idea of a child carrying a special blanket was both funny and psychologically recognisable, and Linus’s blanket became one of the most famous objects in the strip.
Schroeder
Schroeder is passionately devoted to the music of Ludwig van Beethoven.
He spends much of his time playing his toy piano and admiring Beethoven.
His serious devotion to classical music is made especially funny because he is still a small child.
Patty, Shermy and Violet
These were among the early members of the story of Peanuts cast.
Some of the original characters eventually became less important as Schulz developed the personalities of Charlie Brown, Lucy, Linus, Snoopy and others.
This is another example of how a creative work can evolve over time.
But What Exactly Is a Cartoon?
To understand why Peanuts was important, we need to understand a little about the history of cartoons.
The word cartoon has a surprisingly long history.
Originally, a ‘cartoon’ was not necessarily something funny.
The word came from an Italian word meaning a large sheet of paper used for a drawing or design.
Artists used preparatory drawings, or cartoons, when planning large paintings, frescoes and tapestries.
Over time, the meaning changed.
Eventually, a cartoon came to mean an amusing or satirical drawing.
And then another development took place:
Cartoons began to tell stories.
The History of Cartoons
1. Pictures Tell Stories
Long before newspapers and television, people used pictures to communicate ideas.
Ancient peoples painted images on walls and objects.
Medieval artists created illustrated manuscripts.
Artists used pictures to tell stories to people who could not necessarily read.
A sequence of pictures could show events happening one after another.
This basic idea of pictures arranged to communicate a story is one of the foundations of modern comics.
2. Satirical Cartoons
By the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, humorous and political drawings became increasingly popular.
Artists could use exaggeration to make fun of politicians, social customs and important events.
One of the most famous British examples was Punch magazine, founded in 1841.
Political cartoons became an important form of commentary.
Instead of writing a long explanation about a politician, an artist could draw a funny picture that immediately communicated an idea.
This taught readers to understand that pictures could contain arguments and opinions, not merely decoration.
3. Newspapers Change Everything
During the nineteenth century, newspapers became increasingly popular.
Publishers discovered that pictures could attract readers.
Colour printing technology improved.
Large newspapers began publishing illustrated sections.
And eventually, comic characters began appearing regularly in newspapers.
One particularly important character was The Yellow Kid.
Created by cartoonist Richard F. Outcault, The Yellow Kid appeared in American newspapers in the 1890s.
The Library of Congress describes The Yellow Kid as the first successful commercial newspaper comic strip.
The comic was significant because it brought together several features that would become important in newspaper comics:
- recurring characters
- sequential pictures
- humour
- speech
- a continuing visual world
- mass newspaper distribution
By the end of the nineteenth century, the modern newspaper comic strip was beginning to take shape.
4. Comic Strips Become Popular
During the early twentieth century, comic strips became a regular part of newspapers.
Families could turn to the comics page and find familiar characters every day.
Some strips were funny.
Some were adventurous.
Others involved fantasy.
Some involved domestic life.
And some were aimed primarily at children, while others were written for adults.
Characters could appear again and again, creating a relationship between the reader and the fictional world.
This was very different from reading a single joke.
A comic strip could develop characters and relationships over years.
5. The Golden Age of Newspaper Comics
By the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s, newspaper comics had become an enormous part of popular culture.
Characters such as:
- Popeye
- Mickey Mouse
- Dick Tracy
- Blondie
- Little Orphan Annie
- Flash Gordon
and many others became widely recognised.
Comic strips could be adventurous, humorous, dramatic or sentimental.
They were also becoming increasingly sophisticated.
Cartoonists were learning how to use:
- panel size
- facial expressions
- speech
- movement
- timing
- repetition
- visual jokes
- silence
to tell stories.
And then, in 1950, Charles M. Schulz introduced something rather different.
Why Was Peanuts Different?
At first glance, Peanuts might not seem revolutionary.
There were no spectacular drawings.
There were no complicated backgrounds.
The characters were small.
The panels were simple.
And the humour was often based on ordinary conversations.
But this simplicity was actually part of Schulz’s genius.
He realised that you didn’t need enormous drawings to communicate enormous feelings.
A tiny change in a character’s expression could be enough.
And a pause could be funny.
A single sentence could be heartbreaking.
And a character standing silently could sometimes say more than a whole paragraph.
Four Little Panels
The daily Peanuts strip was generally built around four panels.
This was partly practical.
Newspapers had limited space, and editors needed comic strips that could fit into different layouts.
The compact four-panel design was particularly useful because it could be arranged in different ways on the newspaper page.
But Schulz used this restriction creatively.
Each panel became almost like a beat in a piece of music.
Something happens.
A character responds.
The situation changes.
Then comes the punchline.
This is called timing.
And timing is one of the most important skills in cartooning.
The Importance of Silence
One of the fascinating things about Peanuts is that Schulz didn’t always need a joke in every panel.
Sometimes the humour comes from what a character doesn’t say.
A character might look at another character.
There may be a pause.
Then one small comment changes the entire meaning of the scene.
This teaches us something important about visual storytelling:
You don’t have to explain everything.
Sometimes the reader needs to look at the picture and work out what is happening.
The Children Who Talk Like Children and Adults
Schulz’s characters could discuss surprisingly complicated ideas.
But he rarely made them behave exactly like miniature adults.
Instead, he combined:
childhood experiences + adult-sized emotions + comic exaggeration.
A child might be worrying about whether somebody likes them.
Another might be obsessively practising the piano.
Someone else might be convinced that they are an expert on psychology.
These situations are funny because they contain a grain of truth.
Children really do have enormous thoughts.
They really do take small events seriously.
And adults can be surprisingly childish too!
Schulz Drew From Real Life
Charles Schulz didn’t invent his characters in a vacuum.
His experiences, memories and observations influenced his work.
Charlie Brown, for example, has often been understood as reflecting some of Schulz’s own experiences and feelings.
The character’s insecurity, disappointment and determination gave Schulz a way of exploring emotions that he understood personally.
Even some details of the characters’ lives were inspired by people and experiences around him.
This is an excellent lesson for young writers and artists:
Look around you.
People you know can inspire characters.
Things that happen to you can become stories.
A funny conversation can become dialogue.
An embarrassing experience can become a joke.
A disappointment can become part of a character.
Artists don’t always need to invent everything from nothing.
Sometimes they simply need to pay attention.
The Famous Beagle
Snoopy was also influenced by Schulz’s childhood experiences with dogs.
His family had a black-and-white dog named Spike, who became an inspiration for Snoopy.
But Snoopy eventually became much more imaginative than any ordinary dog!
At first, Snoopy simply behaved like a dog.
Over time, Schulz gave him an increasingly rich inner world.
This was an important development.
Readers began to see that Snoopy wasn’t merely a pet.
He had his own thoughts, ambitions and fantasies.
And some of those fantasies were enormous.
Why Did People Love the Story of Peanuts?
One of the secrets of the story of Peanuts was that it could mean different things to different people.
A child might laugh because Lucy is bossy.
A teenager might recognise Charlie Brown’s worries about fitting in.
An adult might understand the frustration of trying hard and still failing.
Someone else might simply enjoy Snoopy’s imagination.
The strip could be funny without requiring everyone to find the same thing funny.
That made it unusually universal.
From Seven Newspapers to the World
The beginning was tiny.
Just seven newspapers.
But Peanuts grew rapidly.
By 1952, the strip was appearing in more than 40 American newspapers, and the first Peanuts book collection had been published. Over the following decades, the characters appeared in:
- newspapers
- books
- greeting cards
- advertisements
- toys
- television programmes
- films
- theatre productions
- school materials
- clothing
- merchandise
The characters became part of popular culture.
But Schulz continued drawing the strip himself.
That is unusual for such a successful comic.
He retained remarkable creative control over his characters and stories throughout his career.
The Story of Peanuts and Television
The characters eventually moved beyond the newspaper.
One of the most important moments came in 1965, when A Charlie Brown Christmas was broadcast.
The television special became enormously popular.
It also demonstrated something fascinating about Schulz’s work.
The characters didn’t need to become completely different when they moved from newspaper to television.
Their personalities were already strong enough to work in another medium.
The special won both a Peabody Award and an Emmy.
Charles Schulz’s Working Method
It is easy to imagine a famous cartoonist sitting down and casually drawing a funny picture.
Schulz’s career shows that cartooning is much more demanding than that.
He had to continually think of new situations, develop characters, write dialogue, compose the drawings, and make the joke work.
And he had to do it again and again.
The Charles M. Schulz Museum notes that Schulz drew the strips in India ink on Strathmore three-ply paper, using pens he preferred for drawing and lettering.
Imagine having to create another comic tomorrow.
And another one the day after that.
And another one the day after that.
For decades!
That takes enormous discipline.
A Cartoonist Who Kept Improving
One of the most valuable lessons from Schulz’s career is that his drawing style changed.
Look at the earliest Peanuts characters and compare them with the characters from later decades.
You can see differences in:
- proportions
- facial expressions
- body shapes
- line quality
- poses
- backgrounds
- character personalities
The changes happened gradually.
Schulz himself commented on the way characters naturally evolved as he continued drawing them.
This is something young artists sometimes need to hear:
You don’t have to be brilliant on your first attempt.
You can improve.
Characters can improve.
Handwriting can improve.
Drawings can improve.
Storytelling can improve.
Your first version does not have to be your final version.
The End of an Era
Charles M. Schulz continued drawing Peanuts for almost fifty years.
He died on 12 February 2000, at the age of 77.
The final original Peanuts strip was published shortly afterwards.
No one else took over the daily strip.
Schulz’s family decided that nobody else should draw new Peanuts newspaper strips after his death.
That means that when we read the original Peanuts newspaper strips, we are reading the work of the same artist who began drawing them in 1950.
That is quite remarkable.
Why Does Peanuts Still Matter?
It would be easy to think of the story of Peanuts simply as a collection of funny cartoons.
But its importance goes much deeper.
Schulz changed what a comic strip could be.
He demonstrated that a newspaper cartoon could explore:
- emotions
- relationships
- failure
- loneliness
- hope
- imagination
- philosophy
- childhood
- adulthood
And he did it with incredibly simple drawings.
His characters didn’t need elaborate costumes or superpowers.
They needed personalities.
That may be one of the most important lessons in storytelling.
A Small Drawing Can Tell a Big Story
Think back to that first Peanuts strip.
Four little panels.
Seven newspapers.
One young cartoonist.
Nobody could have known exactly what would happen next.
Schulz had no way of knowing that his characters would eventually become known throughout the world.
He simply had a blank piece of paper and an idea.
And that is how many creative journeys begin.
Not with certainty.
Not with fame.
And not with millions of people watching.
But with one person deciding to make something.
The Bigger History of Cartooning
When we place Peanuts into the wider history of cartoons, we can see an interesting progression.
Ancient and medieval art
Pictures were used to tell stories and communicate ideas.
↓
Eighteenth and nineteenth-century caricature
Artists used humour and exaggeration to comment on people and politics.
↓
Illustrated magazines
Cartoons became increasingly popular with a mass audience.
↓
1890s newspaper comics
Characters such as The Yellow Kid helped establish the modern newspaper comic strip.
↓
Early twentieth century
Comic strips became a regular part of newspapers and developed recurring characters and continuing stories. See Winsor McCay
↓
1930s–1940s
Comic strips became a major part of popular culture alongside the rapidly developing comic-book and animation industries.
↓
1950
Charles M. Schulz introduced the story of Peanuts.
↓
Later twentieth century
The story of Peanuts expanded into books, television, advertising, merchandise and theatre.
↓
Today
Comic strips, comic books, graphic novels, animated films, webcomics and digital cartoons continue to develop the relationship between words and pictures.
Words + Pictures = Powerful Storytelling
Perhaps the most important thing children can learn from the history of cartoons is that pictures don’t simply decorate words.
Pictures can communicate information themselves.
A cartoonist can show:
- movement
- emotion
- personality
- setting
- relationships
- humour
- action
- silence
all without writing a long explanation.
And when words and pictures work together, they can tell an incredibly complicated story in a very small space.
That is exactly what Charles M. Schulz mastered.
Why Are Comic Strips So Small?
Ask your children to imagine that they are newspaper editors in 1950.
They have a huge newspaper to fill.
They need:
- news
- advertisements
- photographs
- sports
- weather
- articles
- comics
Space is precious.
A comic strip therefore needs to tell its story in a very small area.
This creates a fascinating challenge:
How much story can you fit into four boxes?
Try it yourself!
Draw four empty boxes.
Then tell a complete story using only those four panels.
You will quickly discover that cartooning is harder than it looks.
Homeschool Activity: Create Your Own Four-Panel Comic
Step 1: Choose a character
Your character could be:
- a child
- an animal
- an inventor
- a superhero
- a historical person
- an imaginary creature
Step 2: Give them a problem
Perhaps they:
- lose something
- misunderstand something
- try something new
- make a mistake
- want something they cannot have
- think they have solved a problem
Step 3: Tell the story in four panels
- Panel 1: Introduce the situation.
- Panel 2: Something goes wrong.
- Panel 3: The problem gets worse!
- Panel 4: Give us the ending or punchline.
Remember:
You don’t need lots of words.
Try using facial expressions and body language to tell part of the story.
Think Like Charles Schulz
Here are some questions for older children:
1. Why do you think Schulz chose children as his main characters?
2. Why might readers find Charlie Brown more relatable than a perfect hero?
3. How can a cartoon make us laugh while also making us think?
4. Why is failure an important part of Charlie Brown’s character?
5. How does Snoopy’s imagination make the comic more interesting?
6. Why do you think Schulz disliked the name Peanuts?
7. What advantages does a four-panel comic strip have?
8. What can pictures communicate that words cannot?
9. How has cartooning changed since the nineteenth century?
10. Do you think a cartoon needs complicated artwork to be successful? Why or why not?
An Interesting Historical Comparison
Here’s another challenge for your homeschool.
Choose one cartoon from the nineteenth century, one from around 1900, one from the 1930s–1940s and one from the story of Peanuts.
Compare them.
Look at:
Characters
Are they realistic or exaggerated?
Words
How much dialogue is used?
Pictures
Are there lots of details or very few?
Humour
What is the joke?
Purpose
Is the cartoon designed mainly to entertain, persuade, criticise or tell a story?
Audience
Who do you think it was intended for?
This turns a simple comic strip into a fascinating piece of social history.
What Can Charles M. Schulz Teach Us from the Story of Peanuts?
Perhaps the most valuable part of this story isn’t even Peanuts.
It is Schulz himself.
He wanted to become a cartoonist.
So he studied, practised, and he submitted his work.
He experienced rejection.
But he kept drawing.
He created Li’l Folks.
It eventually became Peanuts.
And then he kept working.
For nearly fifty years.
His story reminds us that creative success rarely happens overnight.
Sometimes the thing you are working on today is simply practice for the thing you will create tomorrow.
From Li’l Folks to a Worldwide Legacy
In 1947, Charles M. Schulz published a small collection of cartoons called Li’l Folks in a local newspaper.
In 1950, the strip was renamed Peanuts and began appearing in seven newspapers.
The characters gradually developed, the audience grew, and the strip spread…and the story of Peanut became a reality.
Snoopy became an international icon.
Charlie Brown became one of the best-known characters in popular culture.
And Schulz became one of the most influential cartoonists of the twentieth century.
Yet the basic ingredients remained surprisingly simple:
A pen.
Some paper.
A few characters.
A sense of humour.
An understanding of people.
And a willingness to keep drawing.
1950: The Story of Peanuts was a Tiny Beginning With a Huge Future
On 2 October 1950, readers in seven American cities opened their newspapers and encountered a new comic strip.
They didn’t know that they were witnessing the beginning of something extraordinary.
They simply saw four little panels.
But inside those four panels was a new way of looking at childhood.
Charles M. Schulz showed that a comic strip could be funny and thoughtful.
It could be simple and profound.
It could make us laugh at the same time as it made us recognise our own worries and weaknesses.
And perhaps that is why Peanuts has lasted for so long.
Although Charlie Brown, Snoopy, Lucy, Linus and their friends live in a world drawn with a few simple lines, their feelings are wonderfully human.
And that is the real genius of Charles M. Schulz.
He understood that sometimes the biggest stories can begin with something very small.
Just four panels.
Just one idea.
And just one person brave enough to put pencil to paper.
A Final Thought for Children
If you could invent your own comic strip, what would it be about?
Who would your main character be?
What would they worry about, what would make them laugh, and what would they keep getting wrong?
And most importantly, what would make readers want to come back tomorrow to see what happens next?
Perhaps, like Charles M. Schulz, you might discover that your simplest idea is the beginning of something much bigger than you ever expected, just like the story of Peanuts did for him!
The Story of Peanuts and Charles M. Schulz: 12 Homeschool Activities
1. Meet Charles M. Schulz: Biography Detective
Ages: 5–16
Subjects: History, biography, reading comprehension
Charles M. Schulz didn’t become a famous cartoonist overnight. He loved drawing from childhood, studied art, worked hard, experienced rejection and eventually created one of the world’s most famous comic strips.
Your Mission
Read the section of the blog post about Charles M. Schulz and see how many facts you can discover about his life.
Younger Children
Draw a picture of Charles Schulz and write or dictate three things you have learned about him.
Try completing these sentences:
Charles Schulz was born in: __________
When he was young, he loved: __________
He wanted to become a: __________
Older Children
Create a short biography of Schulz containing at least 10 important facts.
Then answer:
What qualities did Schulz need in order to become successful?
Think about:
- Practice
- Patience
- Creativity
- Perseverance
- Dealing with rejection
- Observation
Challenge
Write a paragraph answering:
Do you think talent or perseverance was more important to Schulz’s success? Explain your answer.
2. From Li’l Folks to Peanuts
Ages: 7–16
Subjects: History, research, critical thinking
Before Peanuts, Charles Schulz created a comic strip called Li’l Folks.
The characters and ideas in Li’l Folks helped lead to the creation of Peanuts.
Your Mission
Create a ‘Then and Now’ comparison.
Draw two boxes.
Box 1: Li’l Folks
What do you think the early characters might have looked like?
What sort of situations might they have been in?
Box 2: Peanuts
Draw Charlie Brown, Snoopy or another character as they became known in Peanuts.
Think About It
Why do you think artists sometimes change their characters over time?
Older Student Challenge
Explain why the name of a comic strip matters.
Why might a publisher or newspaper syndicate care about the title?
Finally:
Would you have kept the name Li’l Folks, chosen Charlie Brown, or accepted Peanuts? Explain your choice.
3. The History of Cartoons Timeline
Ages: 7–16
Subjects: History, art, chronology
Cartoons didn’t suddenly appear in 1950.
They developed over hundreds of years.
Your Mission
Create a timeline showing how cartoons developed.
Include:
- Ancient pictures used to tell stories
- Medieval illustrated manuscripts
- Eighteenth- and nineteenth-century caricatures
- The founding of Punch magazine in 1841
- The rise of illustrated newspapers
- The Yellow Kid in the 1890s
- Early twentieth-century comic strips
- The Golden Age of newspaper comics
- 1950 — Peanuts begins
- Television cartoons
- Modern comics and graphic novels
- Digital cartoons and webcomics
Younger Children
Draw five pictures showing how cartoons changed.
Older Children
For each event, write:
What changed?
Why was it important?
How did it help lead towards modern cartoons?
Challenge
Draw arrows between the events and explain how one development helped make the next possible.
4. Design Your Own Comic Character
Ages: 5–16
Subjects: Art, creative writing, character development
Charles Schulz created characters with very different personalities.
Now it is your turn!
Your Mission
Invent an original cartoon character.
Give your character:
Name: __________________
Age: __________________
Favourite thing: __________________
Least favourite thing: __________________
Best quality: __________________
Worst habit: __________________
Biggest worry: __________________
Biggest dream: __________________
Something they are always doing: __________________
Now draw your character.
Younger Children
Draw your character and give them a name.
Older Children
Write a full character profile.
Challenge
Write three personality traits that will make your character recognisable even without their name being written underneath the picture.
5. Four Panels: Tell a Story!
Ages: 5–16
Subjects: Art, storytelling, English
One of the great challenges of comic-strip creation is telling a story in a very small amount of space.
Your Mission
Create a four-panel comic.
Panel 1
Something begins…
Panel 2
Something goes wrong…
Panel 3
The problem gets worse!
Panel 4
The ending or punchline!
Remember that pictures can tell part of the story.
You don’t need lots of writing.
Younger Children
Draw the story and add speech bubbles.
Older Children
Try to tell your story using as few words as possible.
Super Challenge
Create a four-panel comic with no words at all.
Can someone else understand what happened?
6. The Art of the Punchline
Ages: 8–16
Subjects: English, comedy, storytelling
Comic strips depend heavily on timing.
The reader needs to see the right information at the right moment.
Your Mission
Write a short comic-strip story with three possible endings.
For example:
- Panel 1: A character announces that they have invented the world’s greatest invention.
- Panel 2: Their friend asks what it does.
- Panel 3: __________
Now create:
- Ending A — A silly ending
- Ending B — An unexpected ending
- Ending C — A surprising ending
Which one is funniest?
Think About It
Why does changing the final panel change the whole story?
Challenge
Explain what makes a good comic-strip punchline.
7. Charlie Brown and the Problem of Failure
Ages: 8–16
Subjects: PSHE, philosophy, English
Charlie Brown is not a traditional superhero.
He doesn’t always win.
He doesn’t always feel confident.
Sometimes he tries very hard and things still go wrong.
Discussion Questions
Why do you think readers like a character who fails?
Does a character need to be successful to be a hero?
What can failure teach us?
How is Charlie Brown different from a traditional superhero?
Younger Children
Draw a picture of a time when you tried something difficult.
Complete:
I tried to __________.
It was difficult because __________.
I learned __________.
Older Children
Write a short essay:
‘Is failure sometimes more interesting than success?‘
Give examples from real life, books, history or cartoons.
8. Create a Character With a Very Big Personality
Ages: 7–16
Subjects: Art, psychology, creative writing
Think about the Peanuts characters.
Lucy is confident.
Linus is thoughtful.
Schroeder loves Beethoven.
Snoopy has an enormous imagination.
Each character can be recognised by their personality.
Your Mission
Invent a group of four cartoon characters.
They should all be different.
For example:
- Character 1: The confident one
- Character 2: The worrier
- Character 3: The dreamer
- Character 4: The practical one
Now put them together in the same situation.
Scenario
They have to build a treehouse.
What happens?
Who takes charge?
And who worries?
Who has the strangest idea?
Who solves the problem?
Challenge
Write a four-panel comic featuring all four characters.
9. Cartoon Historian: Primary Source Detective
Ages: 10–16
Subjects: History, source analysis, critical thinking
A cartoon can be a historical source.
It can tell us what people found funny, what they were worried about and what subjects were considered important.
Your Mission
Choose an old cartoon or comic strip.
Investigate it like a historian.
Answer:
Who created it?
When was it created?
Where was it published?
Who was the intended audience?
What is happening?
What is the joke?
And what does the cartoon tell us about the time in which it was created?
Does that tell us anything about the artist?
What can we NOT know simply by looking at it?
Challenge
Write a historian’s conclusion:
‘This cartoon is useful evidence for historians because…‘
10. Cartoon Then and Now
Ages: 8–16
Subjects: History, art, media studies
Cartoons have changed enormously.
Compare an early newspaper cartoon with a modern cartoon.
Create a comparison chart.
| Feature | Older Cartoon | Modern Cartoon |
|---|---|---|
| Drawing style | ||
| Colours | ||
| Characters | ||
| Speech | ||
| Technology | ||
| Humour | ||
| Audience | ||
| Where we see it |
Think About It
How has technology changed cartoons?
Consider:
- Printing presses
- Colour printing
- Photography
- Television
- Film
- Computers
- Tablets
- The internet
- Social media
Challenge
Imagine you are a cartoonist in 2050.
Where will people see your cartoons?
What will they look like?
11. Make Your Own Newspaper Comic Page
Ages: 5–16
Subjects: Art, English, history
Imagine that it is 1950.
You are the editor of a newspaper.
You need to create a comics page.
Your Mission
Design a newspaper comics page containing:
- A comic strip
- A cartoon character
- A funny headline
- A small advertisement
- A newspaper title
- A date
- A weather box
- A second small cartoon
Younger Children
Concentrate on the pictures.
Older Children
Try to make your page look as though it really belongs in a 1950 newspaper.
Think about:
- Black-and-white printing
- Limited space
- Typefaces
- Headlines
- Advertisements
- Newspaper columns
Challenge
Write a short paragraph explaining:
How would creating a newspaper comic in 1950 be different from creating one today?
12. The Great Cartoonist Challenge
Ages: 5–16
Subjects: Art, English, history, creativity
Now it is time to put everything you have learned together!
Imagine that you are a cartoonist in 1950.
A newspaper has offered you the chance to create a brand-new comic strip.
Your Comic Needs
1. A title
2. A main character
Draw them!
3. At least two supporting characters
Draw them!
4. A setting
Where does your comic take place?
5. A personality
What makes your characters interesting?
6. A problem
What goes wrong?
7. A four-panel comic
Tell your first story.
8. A punchline
Make your reader smile!
Historical Challenge
You must design your comic using technology available in 1950.
Think about:
- Pen and ink
- Paper
- Typewriters
- Printing presses
- Newspaper syndication
There are no computers, tablets, digital drawing programs or social media!
Final Question
If your comic appeared in seven newspapers tomorrow, what would you hope readers would remember about your characters?
The Story of Peanuts Bonus Activity: Could You Have Been a Cartoonist?
This activity works especially well as a final reflection.
Rate yourself from 1–5.
- I enjoy drawing: ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐
- I notice funny things happening around me: ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐
- I enjoy making people laugh: ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐
- I can think of interesting characters: ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐
- I don’t give up easily: ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐
- I enjoy writing stories: ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐
- I can turn an idea into a picture: ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐
Now answer:
- What is your strongest cartoonist skill?
- What would you like to improve?
- What kind of comic strip would you create?
- What would you call it?
The Story of Peanuts: A Final Challenge for the Whole Family
Gather everyone’s four-panel comics together.
Don’t put the names of the artists on them.
Read them all.
Can everyone guess who created each comic?
Then ask which:
Character was the most memorable?
Comic had the funniest ending?
Artist used pictures most effectively?
Story would you want to read again tomorrow?
This is a wonderful way to finish the study because it demonstrates one of the most important lessons from Charles M. Schulz’s career:
A great cartoon isn’t necessarily complicated. It simply needs to communicate an idea, a feeling or a story in a way that makes someone want to look again.
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