21 April 2024

Charles Schulz, axe-murderer ?


An article at the Peanuts wiki discusses the brief life and theoretically gruesome death of "Charlotte Braun," a minor and not-well-liked character in the series.
Charlotte's life in the strip was very short-lived. She made only 10 appearances, the last of which was on February 1, 1955; a victim of being an under-used supporting character with limited comic potential. Her bossy, loudmouthed traits survived, however, in the form of Lucy, who gained much storyline potential after her personality was changed in the mid-1950s (until that time Lucy had functioned as a wide-eyed child of wonder)...

...two months after Schulz died, a Peanuts fan named Elizabeth Swaim informed the Library of Congress that she would be donating a letter to the library, which was revealed that she had written to Schulz in 1955, requesting him to remove Charlotte Braun from the strip. Schulz replied that he would be willing to do so but said that the person who wrote to him would be responsible for "the death of an innocent child". Schulz concluded the letter with a picture of Charlotte Braun with an ax in her head. The letter is now in the United States Library of Congress.

Via Neatorama

8 comments:

  1. "She made only 10 appearances" but no one has collected and posted all ten of them, much less more than one.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Gocomics runs old Peanuts cartoons, and they are available there. As far as I can see, however, you have to know which dates to look at to pull them up. They were rerun not all that long ago, to a bit of conversation, and the ax in the head letter came up in the comments.

      Delete
    2. Thanks for the tip; search results from there are here:

      https://www.gocomics.com/search/full_results?category=comic&terms=charlotte+braun

      Delete
    3. Having seen those ten, it seems that the character never evolved past 'talking loud'?

      Delete
  2. I wonder how much that letter would bring at auction?
    Thank you Ms Swaim and others who donate things to museums and the LofC.
    xoxoxoBruce

    ReplyDelete
  3. The first appearance of Charlotte:

    https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/peanuts/images/8/83/19541130.gif/revision/latest?cb=20130531000147

    Last appearance of Charlotte:

    https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/peanuts/images/a/ae/19550201.gif/revision/latest?cb=20130709005538

    ReplyDelete