Description
About the stamp designs: The stamps picture 10 of Schultz’s PEANUTS characters from his existing artwork. The center of the complete pane of 20 includes a black-and-white photograph of Schulz taken in 1987.
First Day City: The First Day of Issue Ceremony was held in Santa Rosa, California, home of the Charles M. Schulz Museum and Research Center.
History the stamp represents: Charles M. Schulz once described himself as “born to draw comic strips.” At just two days old, an uncle nicknamed him “Sparky” after Spark Plug the horse from the Barney Google comic strip. Throughout his youth, he and his father shared a Sunday-morning ritual of reading the funnies.
After serving in the Army in World War II, Schulz’s first big break came in 1947 when he sold a cartoon feature called Li’l Folks to the St. Paul Pioneer Press. In 1950, Schulz met with United Feature Syndicate, and on October 2 of that same year, PEANUTS, as termed by the syndicate, debuted in seven newspapers.
Charles Schulz populated his world with characters featuring unique personalities, who would “fully inhabit their issues.” He would mix and match them for maximum comedic effect. The core cast of characters is so well-defined that each one could carry a story by themselves.
Schulz created dynamic, three-dimensional characters whose storylines were driven by their imperfect personalities. This is what elevates Peanuts from a simple comic strip to a substantial work of literature.
In all, Schulz produced 17,897 Peanuts comic strips, which had been called, “arguably the longest story ever told by one human being.” He spent 50 years building a legacy that would give the world Charlie Brown, Snoopy, and a whole cast of characters that forever changed the landscape of American comic strips.
5 sheets of 100 First-Class Forever® USPS postage stamps. *The slash over “Forever” in the image is to protect it from being used to produce counterfeit postage. Actual stamps will not have this.
