July 3, 1952: Cute little puppy dog

How does someone with a face covered with hair blush?

Looking at Violet walking here, she looks very similar to the style of the characters for the next few years. She's almost at the proportions of classic Peanuts now. Charlie Brown is the human character who still looks the most like the original, with his oval head and thick eye-dots. And Snoopy takes still more time, and doesn't get to the familiar look for many years.

Turnabout strip! What does it say about the Peanuts world that chasing someone, presumably to inflict violence, happens so often?

June 16, 1952: A reasonable request

There is a whimsicalness to early Peanuts that I find appealing. It's not just that Lucy washed her hands in Charlie Brown's glass of milk, it's that she asked nicely first like this is standard Lucy protocol.

Turnabout strip!

May 24, 1952: Lucy is non-repentant

A rather different context for the chase/turnabout formula. This is a solid step along the way to Lucy's later personality. Her expression in panel two is like a shadow spreading over the strip. Lucy's on her way and she's not bring flowers and candy canes!

May 15, 1952: Exit, pursued by girls, stage left

It's another turnabout/chase strip, although the cause this time isn't Charlie Brown smarting off, or at least not on purpose.

What is it about comic characters chasing each other that works? What would they do if they caught him? Inflict violence? Is that funny?

I don't seem to remember Lucy being the chaser in many turnabout strips. Generally, she's probably more likely just to slug someone and get it over with.

March 22, 1952: About face

It's a turnabout/chase strip in which Charlie Brown didn't intentionally insult Patty. He seems to be growing out of his smart-aleck phase.

February 26, 1952: Dolls are not good melee weapons

It's been a while since we had a turnabout/chase strip! Patty threatening to hit CB with her beloved doll is nice.

September 6, 1951: Another dog?!

It's a dog other than Snoopy or his brothers! This strip establishes that, for now at least, Snoopy is noticeably smaller than other dogs.

August 13, 1951: Comic magazine

A prescient strip. Here's the article from inside that issue.

(Also, it's another turnabout chase strip.)

June 22, 1951: Nyuk nyuk nyuk

Patty gets back at Charlie Brown for past chase strips.

Two things:
1. Charlie Brown's mouth looks a little weird in the last panel.  Ever see Grim Fandango?
2. It's a bit less funny when it's a boy chasing a girl after a bad joke.

May 5, 1951: Groan

Another chase.  I have to disagree with Charlie Brown in the last panel, that was not really all that notable a joke.

April 5, 1951: Who's on first?

Turnabout, chase, bad joke, etc.  Charlie Brown's quip this time, "Someday I'll probably drive this poor girl crazy," shows Schulz's recognition of the pattern.  It's pretty funny this time anyway.

Whose house is Patty and Charlie Brown in in this one, Patty's?  Which is it usually?  Does Charlie Brown ever go home?

EDIT: Somehow I didn't get the embed code into this one the first time. Shame, as this is one of the funnier strips I've seen yet.

March 21, 1951: Snoopy is irate

A surprisingly angry Snoopy chases Charlie Brown around the place while Patty and Violet look on.

When I was a kid, I had opportunity once to leaf through a kids' book called something like A Charlie Brown Dictionary, which was a list of words and definitions punctuated with Peanuts strips.  There was a spot where, in explaining one of the strips, the book took pains to communicate to my prepubescent mind that, despite what was seen in the comic, Snoopy would never bite anyone.

Yeah, right.

March 15, 1951: Charlie Brown's youth-preserving regimen

Another turnabout joke, that being my name for these strips where there's a sudden rush of anger in the last panel based on something a character said, flipping the mood instantly from casual conversation to rage.

The cause here is another insult to Patty, resulting in another exclamation point, and another comment from Charlie Brown during the following chase. The joke here is actually rather funny.

February 14, 1951: Valentine's Day

Another turnabout strip, another chase, and more of CB's playful insulting of Patty's looks.  The punchline, "It's risky, but I get my laughs!" is almost the same as a prior chase strip, I notice.

At first, Peanuts didn't take much notice of holidays. My theory is that, as a cartoonist's run continues, their initial stockpile of ideas and energy becomes depleted as the enormity of the task settles in, and they start having to riff on whatever comes to mind. That is the true test for a published cartoonist, not how great the strip is at first, but can they keep it up?

January 22, 1951: He's asking for it

Another chase here, after Charlie Brown slyly insults Patty, who is beginning to show almost Lucy-like characteristics of ire.  Also, check out Charlie Brown's Shakesperian posing in the third panel.  It's best not to compare the length of his arms to the size of his head here.

Another thing to notice here is that the characters, viewed from the site, don't look tremendously different from their modern incarnations.  When we get a head-on or three-quarters view, however, they'll still look fairly alien.

January 10, 1951: The chase is on

Another example of the last-panel turnabout joke, this time involving a chase.  Be warned: a lot of these are coming up.  It's funny how this joke, about "being hot" would be considered flirtatious today.  I like the exclamation point above Patty's head in the third panel, a way to show surprise without having it register on the character's face.

The punchline from Charlie Brown, "I get my laughs," is rather meta.  The formula on this style of joke is pretty strict, and the ultimate humor relies on coming up with something for the joking character to say in reference to his motive in the last panel.  Schulz used them enough that he must have had a hard time coming up with fresh punchlines for these sequences.