November 29-December 4: GOOD OL' CHARLOTTE BRAUN

November 29, 1954

He is a dog, after all. I'm surprised that Snoopy's amazing, candy-detecting nose failed to realize Charlie Brown had no candy on him.

November 30, 1954

Here is introduced the second of Peanuts' one-joke characters, and the first character to eventually leave its cast. 'Pig-Pen' lasts until nearly the end of the strip because there have always been, and could well always be, dirty kids. Poor ol' Charlotte Braun's niche gets taken up by Lucy pretty quickly though.

How weird is it that CB's friends tend to call him "Good Ol'" Charlie Brown, and that he remarks upon it?

December 1, 1954

This is one of those strips where the setting changes from panel to panel in such a way that it implies that the conversation is longer than we're seeing on the page. Particularly, between panels two and three, Violet and Charlotte suddenly go from standing on a path to sitting at a curb, and Charlie Brown has had materialize a tree to ineffectively hide behind -- which suggests that Charlie Brown has been stalking the two to eavesdrop on their conversation.

December 2, 1954

December 3, 1954

Charlotte's mouth in the third panel is pretty funny. I think, some time later, some of Charlotte's character was used for Sally; the hair is somewhat similar, and she has a similar head shape.

Snoopy shows distress very well. And I love how Charlotte doesn't even look particularly distressed when she shouts in the last panel. The reactions of Charlie Brown and Snoopy serve to illustrate her volume.

December 4, 1954

I don't think this will be the last time we see those words spoken. Scribble of ire!

May 30, 1951: Schroeder's first appearance

He doesn't have his piano yet, doesn't have his striped shirt, barely has any hair, his personality consists of  blank stare, and can't even talk, but it's the same Schroeder who would later idolise Beethoven and fend off Lucy's advances.

Oh, how much this strip changed over the years.  Most comic strips, those that were ever any good, start off great and trail off over the years, as the need to continue bringing in an income overrode any considerations of quality.  Peanuts went the other way, starting off sharp but gaggy, then gaining profundity.  Its characters changed so much since 1951, they're like different people.  (I had to stop myself from saying "between then and now," it's hard to believe that Charles Schulz has been gone for over nine years.)

February 7, 1951:Violet is introduced

Here is the introduction of Violet, another frequent player in the early Peanuts roster.

Patty lasts in the strip longer than Shermy, but is later completely supplanted by "Peppermint" Patty. Schulz and Peanuts states that the Patty characters were both based on the same real-life person, with the second one being closer to her actual personality, although with decades between the characters' heydays it's easy to allow him some leeway in his depiction.

Violet leaves the strip as a major player a little later than Patty (if my memory holds up), but would occasionally show up even in the 90s.