50 Fun Facts About Charlie Brown

Which 1969 Moon mission used Charlie Brown and Snoopy as the call signs of its two spacecraft?

Apollo 10 was the dress rehearsal for the first Moon landing, and its lunar module Snoopy dropped to within nine miles of the surface. Charlie Brown, the command module, waited in orbit above.

Which band's documentary film beat A Boy Named Charlie Brown to the Oscar for best original song score?

The Beatles took the award for Let It Be, so the Peanuts film, with songs by Rod McKuen, came away with only a nomination.

Which future Stranger Things star made his acting debut voicing Charlie Brown in The Peanuts Movie?

Noah Schnapp voiced Charlie Brown in the 2015 film at the very start of his career, a year before he turned up on Netflix as Will Byers.

Which staple of 1960s TV cartoons did Charles Schulz flatly refuse to add to A Charlie Brown Christmas?

A laugh track was standard for TV animation, but Schulz felt audiences should not be told when to laugh. Its absence helped convince the network that the show would be a disaster.

Which soft drink company commissioned and sponsored A Charlie Brown Christmas for its first broadcast?

Coca-Cola wanted a holiday special to sponsor and needed an outline within days, so Schulz and his producer drew one up in less than a day. The finished show was made in just six months.

Which metal were the fashionable artificial trees made of that Charlie Brown rejects in A Charlie Brown Christmas?

Aluminum trees were a 1960s craze that the special turned into a symbol of holiday commercialism. It is credited with ending the fad, which had almost passed by 1967.

What does Charlie Brown find in his trick-or-treat bag at every house in It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown?

A rock was Schulz's idea, and when the producer called it too cruel, Schulz and his animator answered by making it three. Viewers mailed packages of sweets to the studio in sympathy.

Which dog breed's name does Charlie Brown misspell to lose the national final in A Boy Named Charlie Brown?

Beagle comes out as B-E-A-G-E-L, the one word he ought to know, since it is Snoopy's breed. He had spelled several other words correctly before it.

What does Linus wrap around the base of the drooping little tree to steady it in A Charlie Brown Christmas?

His security blanket props up the sapling, and once the others add decorations taken from Snoopy's doghouse, even Lucy concedes that Charlie Brown chose well.

Which breakfast food joins popcorn, pretzel sticks and jelly beans on the menu in A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving?

Toast is about all Charlie Brown can cook, so it anchors the feast he throws together when friends invite themselves over. One enraged guest rejects the meal for lacking traditional foods.

What does Lucy hold for Charlie Brown to kick in a long-running Peanuts gag, only to pull it away?

A football is what Lucy whips away at the last instant, year after year. Violet was the first to hold it for him, in a strip from November 1951.

What does Charlie Brown keep losing to a hungry tree whenever he tries to fly one in Peanuts?

A kite of Charlie Brown's always ends up tangled in the Kite-Eating Tree. In a 1977 storyline he bit the tree in revenge and got a legal notice from the Environmental Protection Agency.

Which bold pattern runs across Charlie Brown's shirt, first drawn on a plain T-shirt in December 1950?

A zigzag first crossed his plain T-shirt on December 21, 1950, less than three months after the strip began. By 1952 the T-shirt had become a polo shirt with a collar.

What does Lucy sell Charlie Brown for a nickel from a booth that parodies a lemonade stand in Peanuts?

Psychiatric advice costs five cents at Lucy's booth, and Charlie Brown is her usual customer. Real psychiatrists have written about her, one playfully calling her very much the modern doctor.

Which nickname does Peppermint Patty use for Charlie Brown, whom nearly everyone else calls by his full name?

Chuck is Peppermint Patty's name for him, just as she insists on calling Lucy 'Lucille'. Her friend Marcie prefers the more formal Charles.

Which Peanuts character, born into the strip in 1959, is Charlie Brown's younger sister?

Sally arrived in May 1959, when Charlie Brown dashed out of the house yelling that he had a new baby sister and then handed out chocolate cigars. She first appeared on the page that August.

Which feature gives a name to the unseen girl Charlie Brown adores but never dares approach in Peanuts?

Her red hair is nearly all readers learn of the Little Red-Haired Girl, shown in the strip only once, in silhouette. Schulz drew on his own lost love, an accountant named Donna Mae Johnson.

Which position does Charlie Brown play on the hapless Peanuts baseball team that he also manages?

Pitcher is his post, and he manages the side too, though in his first baseball strip in March 1951 he crouched behind the plate instead.

Which trade does Charlie Brown's father follow in Peanuts, the same one Charles Schulz's own father practised?

Barber was the trade of Carl Schulz, and the cartoonist handed it to Charlie Brown's dad as one of many nods to his own childhood. Both mothers were housewives, too.

Which Beethoven-loving Peanuts pianist also plays catcher on Charlie Brown's baseball team?

Schroeder catches for the team but never throws the ball back, walking it out to the mound instead so that rivals will not discover his lack of ability.

Which Gospel does Linus quote on stage to explain the meaning of the holiday in A Charlie Brown Christmas?

Luke supplies the passage about the shepherds, which Schulz insisted on keeping although his producer and animator feared religion was too controversial for television.

Which job does Lucy talk Charlie Brown into taking on the group's play in A Charlie Brown Christmas?

Director is the job Lucy prescribes from her booth as a cure for his seasonal gloom. His pick of a scrawny real tree for the stage only earns him more scorn from the cast.

Which network first aired A Charlie Brown Christmas in December 1965, bumping The Munsters from the schedule?

CBS braced for a flop, yet 45 percent of people watching television that evening tuned in, and only Bonanza drew more viewers. It reran the special every year until 2000.

Which jazz pianist scored A Charlie Brown Christmas after its producer heard one of his records on the radio?

Vince Guaraldi got the call on the strength of his crossover hit Cast Your Fate to the Wind. He kept scoring Peanuts specials until 1976, recording one on the afternoon of the day he died.

Which muted brass instrument stands in for the voices of teachers and other adults in the Charlie Brown TV specials?

A trombone with a mute replaces the offscreen teacher's words, an idea from the specials' composer that the team kept because they found it funny.

What do Charlie Brown's guests sit around for their backyard holiday meal in A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving?

A ping-pong table and chairs set up outside by Snoopy serve as the dining room. He then deals out the plates like a casino dealer.

Which future M*A*S*H actor first played Charlie Brown in the 1967 musical You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown?

Gary Burghoff created the role off-Broadway, then found fame as Radar O'Reilly, the only regular to carry his part from the film into the television series.

Which future Wicked star won a Tony Award as Charlie Brown's little sister in a 1999 Broadway revival?

Kristin Chenoweth won Best Featured Actress in a Musical for You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown, four years before she originated Glinda the Good Witch.

Which vocal group had a top-ten hit in 1959 with a song called Charlie Brown, unrelated to the Peanuts boy?

The Coasters cut it as a follow-up to Yakety Yak, and the songwriters Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller have insisted they did not have Schulz's character in mind.

Which British band released a single called Charlie Brown from their 2011 album Mylo Xyloto?

Coldplay cut an early lyric that named the Peanuts character, but the title stayed because the band could not think of a better one. For a while the song was called Cartoon Heart.

Which country do Charlie Brown and his friends visit as exchange students in the film Bon Voyage, Charlie Brown?

France is where Charlie Brown gets a mysterious invitation to stay at the Château du Mal Voisin, a name that means House of the Bad Neighbor.

Which vast Russian novel must Charlie Brown read for a book report in Happy New Year, Charlie Brown?

War and Peace is the last-minute assignment that spoils his Christmas break, with a big party on New Year's Eve as his main distraction. He does finish the book and hand in his report.

Which illness does a classmate named Janice face in the Peanuts special Why, Charlie Brown, Why?

Leukemia is the diagnosis Janice explains from her hospital bed. The special has since been shown in hospitals and classrooms to explain the disease to children.

What kind of place is Daisy Hill, where Charlie Brown's parents bought Snoopy to cheer him up in Peanuts?

A puppy farm called Daisy Hill sold Snoopy to the Browns after another kid had bullied their son. A later TV special, Snoopy's Reunion, shows the first meeting of boy and dog.

Who was the real Charlie Brown, whose name Charles Schulz borrowed for the hero of Peanuts?

A co-worker at Art Instruction, where Schulz graded students' drawings from 1946, lent the character his name. Schulz had once taken the same correspondence course himself.

In which earlier Charles Schulz cartoon series was the name Charlie Brown first used, in May 1948?

Li'l Folks ran in a Minnesota newspaper from 1947 to 1950 and had no recurring characters. It also featured a dog that looked much like the early Snoopy.

Which animator of the Charlie Brown TV specials also supplied the voices of Snoopy and Woodstock?

Bill Melendez, born in Mexico, had animated for Disney and Warner Bros. before Peanuts. Old recordings of his Snoopy were reused in The Peanuts Movie, made after his death.

Which outdoor activity do the kids compete in against camp bullies in Race for Your Life, Charlie Brown?

River rafting came to Schulz as a plot after he tried it with his wife on the Rogue River. In the film the gang takes on a trio of bullies and their bobcat, Brutus.

Which sport gives Charlie Brown a rare win in the TV special You're a Good Sport, Charlie Brown?

Motocross is the race he wins by being the only rider to cross the finish line. The promised grand prize turns out to be unavailable, so he is handed five free haircuts instead.

Which state does Snoopy's magic act leave Charlie Brown stuck in during the special It's Magic, Charlie Brown?

Invisible is how he stays after rain cuts short Snoopy's show as the Great Houndini. One attempted fix, a sheet draped over him, makes Charlie Brown think he is looking at a ghost.

Which kind of store do the kids mistake for an art museum in There's No Time for Love, Charlie Brown?

A supermarket is where Charlie Brown, Peppermint Patty, Marcie and a few friends end up after a run of misunderstandings and wrong turns on a class outing, with midterm exams looming.

Where does Charlie Brown first meet Franklin, the first Black character in Peanuts, in a 1968 strip?

At the beach is where the two boys meet and play ball in July 1968. Schulz explained that they had never crossed paths before because they went to different schools.

Which carmaker used animated Charlie Brown commercials to sell its Falcon compact, years before any TV special?

Ford put the Peanuts kids in animated spots for the Falcon from 1960, and Schulz said the campaign was the first time licensing his characters earned a lot of money.

Which Minnesota city, where Charles Schulz grew up, lined its streets with Charlie Brown statues in summer 2001?

Saint Paul began the tribute in 2000 with 101 five-foot statues of Snoopy, then gave Charlie Brown his turn a year later. Lucy and Linus followed over the next two summers.

Which child actor was the first voice of Charlie Brown, from a 1963 documentary through the 1969 feature film?

Peter Robbins called Charlie Brown his childhood hero, and as an adult he wore a tattoo of the boy and Snoopy on his arm. Younger actors took over the part when he reached his teens.

Which First World War poem does Linus recite among red poppies near Ypres in What Have We Learned, Charlie Brown?

In Flanders Fields is recited near the dressing station where John McCrae was inspired to write it. The special first aired on Memorial Day in 1983 and was introduced by Schulz himself.

Which producer of the Charlie Brown specials first approached Schulz after making a documentary about Willie Mays?

Lee Mendelson reasoned that after filming baseball's best player he should film its worst. He later wrote the words of the Christmas special's opening song himself when no lyricist could be found.

What did Charlie Brown hit in a 1993 Peanuts strip to win a baseball game, a rare triumph after decades of defeats?

A home run off a girl named Royanne made Charlie Brown the hero at last, more than forty years into the strip. Two years later he also beat a boy named Joe Agate at marbles.

Which city hosts the national contest Charlie Brown travels to by bus in the film A Boy Named Charlie Brown?

New York is where the film stages the big final, and it is also where the movie opened, at Radio City Music Hall, as only the third animated feature ever to play there.

What does Violet draw on Charlie Brown's bald head at her party in It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown?

Jack-o'-lantern designs are tried out on him because Violet wants a model, a poor reward for the invitation he had proudly announced to a disbelieving Lucy.