The Peanuts Every Sunday series was released in hardcover by Fantagraphics starting in 2013. The ten-book series released the Sunday comics in an oversized coffee-table-book format with roughly five-year increments, the first volume being the first four years. Starting in 2025, the series is being released in a more wallet-friendly paperback version. The first volume that collects 1952-1955 has arrived on shelves and coffee tables.
Buy Peanuts Every Sunday: 1952-1955: Paperback EditionThe Sunday strips have been reprinted often, but rarely are they in their original color, and they haven’t been featured in such a large format that shows off the richness of the backgrounds and the accomplished line work. The Sunday comic section was always special growing up because of the dedicated section of the paper. You could grab the section and read it spread it out on the floor. Peanuts was my favorite daily strip, often with it’s own continuation through the week. The Sunday strip brought the characters to life in color along with more frames to tell a larger single-strip story.
The average fan isn’t likely to be familiar with the strips from this era. The strips that are often referenced and reprinted are from the ’70s and ’80s. It can be a little jarring to the new fan that the cast are drawn as much younger children in this era. Linus crawls, Snoopy walks on all fours, and characters like Violet, Patty and Shermy are frequently featured. The daily strip had been around since October 2, 1950 and the Sunday strip debuted January 6, 1952. It hadn’t changed noticeably in the first 15 months compared to the evolution that the reader will see in this volume. The characters are aged up a little, the jokes become more complex, and the design looks more familiar by 1955.
January 6, 1952: The single joke is that Snoopy bites when he plays tag with the children. It’s funny how much of a parody of the characters that they appear to be with their oversize heads.
March 9, 1952: Shermy and Charlie Brown have three hours to play golf before the club opens and they have to be off the course. After running from shot to shot, the reveal is that they finish Hole 1 at exactly Noon.
April 5, 1953: Probably the most surprising aspect of these early strips is Charlie Brown’s anger. The later decades would show off a “lovable loser” personality trait. In this strip, Charlie Brown shares a chocolate cream candy with Snoopy and then spends the rest of the strip angry at Snoopy for not taking the time to taste the chocolate.
July 12, 1953: Lucy debuted in March 1952. By July 1953, she was taller and had aged up a little. She is reading a book that she says she enjoyed more than any other. It is also the first book that she’s ever read. I haven’t done an official study, but other than Charlie Brown, it feels like Lucy is featured more than any other character in the Sunday strips.
March 14 / Marcy 21, 1954: These two weekly strips start to hint at the “can’t win” aspect to Charlie Brown’s character. On March 14, he spends time crafting and stacking a pyramid of snowballs. When he goes to throw one at Lucy as she walks by, he picks one up and they are all frozen together. On March, 21, the seasons have changed and Charlie Brown is humming and building a sand castle. Patty comes along and stomps it to pieces. The last few panels are what I love about the strip. First, Charlie Brown looks down as the dust settles. His first reaction is shaking anger. The next panel has him walking home. The depth of the next two is beautifully simple. First, he takes off his shirt and then with a crooked mouth that looks like he is about to cry, he takes off his shoes and socks. The last panel is the heartbreaking moment when Charlie Brown is in bed under the covers with a single word balloon, “Sigh.”
July 11, 1954: The joke here has the same feeling of the type that will make Sally my favorite in future decades. Charlie Brown and Lucy are on a walk when Lucy stops because there is “fuzz” on the sidewalk. When Charlie teases her and goes to remove the fuzz, he discovers it’s a bug. The last frame has the two walking back the opposite direction with Lucy saying they can walk around the whole block when they are older. Bonus for the scared Charlie Brown panel with him screaming “Aak!! IT MOVED” with his tongue out. It was also while reading this that I realized in June 1954 that Charlie Brown’s shirt changed from red to yellow. It seems to vary still for a few years.
April 10 / April 17, 1955: The baseball themes shown here would continue right through until the end of the strip. The April 10th strip has the ongoing theme of Charlie Brown wanting to continue playing even during rainstorms. His frustration with everyone leaving (“Cowards! Quitters!”) is shown as he throws down his glove, and it floats away in the flood. April 17th has 17 panels packed in there. Charlie Brown is throwing pitches and Schroeder brings each one back to the mound. Charlie Brown tells him to just throw it back, but Schroeder doesn’t want to tip the other team off to the fact that he can’t throw as far as second base. The different wind-ups that Charlie Brown uses have to be tributes to some of Schulz’s favorite pitchers.
December 25, 1955: The characters have grown considerably since the 1952 strips. Their bodies are taller and their heads are more proportional. Charlie Brown is talking to Patty and Violet to collect money to buy Snoopy a Christmas present. They give him some nickels, telling him how wonderful it is that he is doing a selfless thing for Snoopy. Charlie Brown walks away smiling that the girls didn’t make him feel inferior like they usually did. The last panel cuts to Patty saying “Boy, what a dope that Charlie Brown is.” It’s a callback to the very first strip from 1950, and it’s an illustration of the theme that people are nice to your face but say bad things about you when you aren’t there.
I look forward to the next nine releases in the series as an affordable addition to the bookshelves. The growth here and in the next book is interesting to watch the weekly evolution of our favorite characters. The humor remains comfortable and timeless.
