November 7, 1952: Fussbudget

This is the first time the word "fussbudget" has been used in the strip. Now this word is almost impossible to separate from Peanuts. It is always, or nearly always at least, connected with Lucy.

Lucy hasn't been extremely fussy up to this point, but in Peanuts, when another character makes explicit reference to some trait supposedly possessed by another character, that tends to be the point where that other character begins exhibiting that trait as a defining characteristic. In other words, when someone is labeled, the label becomes indelibly part of them.

This is how most Peanuts characters evolved over time, and especially how they gained the traits for which they became memorable.

November 6, 1952: Snoopy follows the trail

I'm linking this one because there's been a running gag for a little while now, one that intensifies a bit in the months to come, about Snoopy's ability to infallibly seek out someone with some kind of snack treat and beg. He carries this skill to great heights in upcoming strips.

November 5, 1952: Charlie Brown is a budding cartoonist

The most interesting thing about this, beside the metahumor and Schulz playfully mocking his own pretensions, is that Charlie Brown's work on the comic is rather large. Of course, most cartoonists work at a scale we would consider to be very large, and artists for realistic strips are known to work larger still. But unless Charlie Brown were a serious comics groupie, he wouldn't know that. (Schulz may have been such a groupie himself; he might have known as a kid.)

November 4, 1952: Linus' head is too big, #1

There are a number of these strips that deal with baby Linus' head weighing him down. This is but the first.

Sunday, November 2, 1952: I've been tricked!!

A favorite strip of mine! Also a chase, this time after Lucy who is beginning to show her true colors.

November 1, 1952: Happy Day After Halloween

Early Peanuts has a number of day-after-holiday strips. One of my favorites, still to come, is a day after April 1 strip.

Halloween, 1952: Do your worst!

Remarkably cocky of Patty here, but then maybe she knows her opponents.

Scribble of ire!

October 30, 1952: Punkin

Compared to other comics, Peanuts characters are unusually poker-faced. The only hint of the kid's slow burn leading up to the last panel, perhaps, is that Charlie Brown is a little too happy in repeating Lucy's mispronounced line.

It's difficult to imagine him getting away with this later on.

October 28, 1952: Fickle Lucy

There are some character combinations that seemed to inspire funny situations to Schulz, while some others didn't get used much. Lucy is funny with many other characters (Charlie Brown and Linus now, Snoopy and Schroeder later on). Patty is most often shown interacting with Charlie Brown or Violet. Maybe that's one of the things that led to poor Shermy's obsolescence, he doesn't have many other characters who react to him.

October 27, 1952: Snoopy and Linus

Snoopy and Linus get to be a double-act at times. When Sally joins the strip later, she and Snoopy team up occasionally, sometimes against Linus.