Happy birthday to me!
Cartoon by Charles M. Schulz, 1957
It is, of course, also my twin sister Jean’s birthday. No, we’re not identical. 😉
Category: Charles M. Schulz
The all-time greatest comic strip
John McCain as a ‘Peanuts’ character
A drawing by Charles M. Schulz shows how John McCain would have us see him — young and energetic, and ready to move into the White House.
Bill Melendez, 1916 – 2008
Bill Melendez, who animated Charlie Brown and the Peanuts gang, has died. Melendez also did the unmistakable “voice” of Snoopy.
Sally “Lucy” Dryer, Gail “Peppermint Patty” DeFaria, Peter “Charlie Brown” Robbins, Chris “Linus” Shea, and Bill “Snoopy” Melendez.
FBOFW
Lynn Johnston has finished her comic strip “For Better Or For Worse.” It’s now a somewhat ironic title, given that Lynn and her husband are divorcing, but she didn’t call the strip “Till Death Do Us Part.”
I enjoyed FBOFW very much for a long time, but my interest petered out towards the end. Eric hit the spot when he described it as having turned into a “chicken soup for the soul sort of thing.”
Johnston belongs to what I believe is pretty much the last generation of syndicated newspaper comic strip creators. For better or for worse, the great, grand age of print media is over, having been replaced by electronic media.
I scanned the last daily and Sunday installments of FBOFW from the Boston Globe. I for one still get home delivered newspapers, but I have to admit I don’t jump on them right away like I used to, because I get most of my news online and from NPR.
Johnston owes something to Sparky Schulz, and she has expressed that gratitude elsewhere, but it would have been nice for her to acknowledge it in her last Sunday panel.
Meet Joe Motocross
Monte Schulz pointed out here on DogRat last year, that his brother Craig — and only Craig — was a dirt bike rider. Once again I refer you to the Coffee Lane portion of the documentary “Good Ol’ Charles Schulz,” where you can see both Craig and Monte.
Craig has an article in the October ’08 Racer X Illustrated, and he tells about riding dirt bikes.
The sound would travel for miles, and like a mating call, it would summon my buddies to head on over to my place to practice. My parents must have received plenty of phone calls, but I never heard of any complaints.
I’m struck by the fact there is something of a similarity in the contrast between Monte and his brother Craig, and me with my brother Jeff, who also rode dirt bikes. This picture of Craig could almost be one of my brother from that same period of time. Maybe I can get him to send one so you can see what I mean.
Guess the Cartoonist
I wonder if this cartoon was inspired by the famous photo of the Times Square kiss on V-J Day? Can you name the cartoonist?
I’m as good as anybody at recognizing the work of somebody I’m familiar with, but looking at this I see no hint whatsoever of his later style. He was a successful, well-known contemporary of Charles Schulz. In fact, for about the first ten years of ‘Peanuts’ he was more successful than Schulz.