On Feb. 12, 2000, Charles Schulz died of a heart attack. His final Peanuts comic appeared in newspapers the following morning.
That timing wasn’t something he arranged. At 77 and in poor health, he had completed the strip a month before. Even so, it’s the detail people bring up first when they discuss how Peanuts came to a close, and 26 years on it still hits hard.
The moment Peanuts stopped was out of Schulz’s hands. The way it said goodbye was his call, and that’s the reason the last strip has lasted.
A goodbye printed twice
Readers saw the farewell in two forms. The first, which ended the daily strip, was published on Monday, Jan. 3, 2000. Snoopy sat at his typewriter, and beneath him was a note beginning “Dear Friends…”
The complete message deserves a careful read:
“I have been fortunate to draw Charlie Brown and his friends for almost 50 years. It has been the fulfillment of my childhood ambition. Unfortunately, I am no longer able to maintain the schedule demanded by a daily comic strip. My family does not wish Peanuts to be continued by anyone else, therefore I am announcing my retirement. I have been grateful over the years for the loyalty of our editors and the wonderful support and love expressed to me by the fans of the comic strip. Charlie Brown, Snoopy, Linus, Lucy… how can I ever forget them…”
It looked like the finish. More was still to come.
Because Sunday strips were made further in advance than the weekday ones, five additional Sunday comics appeared over January and February. On Feb. 13, 2000, a Sunday edition of the farewell followed. Its text matched the daily version. What changed was the opening: Charlie Brown, holding the phone, says “No, I think he’s writing…” before the panel cuts back to Snoopy at the typewriter.
The message ran underneath, surrounded by some of the best-remembered Peanuts images from the past 50 years. That Sunday strip is the official last Peanuts comic.
The final weekday strip shows the strain
Saturday, Jan. 1, 2000, brought the last “true” weekday strip. While the kids throw snowballs at each other, Snoopy studies one by himself. The caption says: “Suddenly the dog realized that his dad had never taught him how to throw snowballs.”
The lines give it away. They’re visibly shaky, a sign on the page of the difficulty Schulz was having with drawing.
His health began to decline in November 1999. He suffered a series of strokes, and doctors discovered colorectal cancer. Chemotherapy followed, yet he kept getting worse, his eyesight included, and he announced his retirement on Dec. 14, 1999. He said plainly then that he hadn’t wanted to stop. He just could no longer keep Peanuts going.
After the snowball strip, that Sunday’s comic was a routine Peppermint Patty and Marcie joke drawn weeks before. Monday brought “Dear Friends.”
Peanuts opened with a line about hating Charlie Brown
A strip that ended so softly began with a nasty punchline. Peanuts debuted on Oct. 2, 1950. Shermy and Patty (just Patty, not Peppermint Patty), two characters few readers remember now, are sitting on a curb as Charlie Brown approaches.
“Well! Here comes ol’ Charlie Brown!” Shermy says. Once Charlie Brown passes, Shermy says nearly the same thing again: “Good ol’ Charlie Brown… Yes, sir!” A third panel repeats “Good ol’ Charlie Brown.” Then Shermy faces Patty: “How I hate him!”
Schulz had already been trying out a version of the concept. From 1947 to 1950, Li’l Folks appeared in Minnesota’s St. Paul Pioneer Press. Cute kids were the focus there too, though it lacked the fixed cast Peanuts later had. Schulz left after his editor refused to pay him more than the $10 he earned for each comic.
He brought Li’l Folks to United Feature Syndicate, which distributed cartoons nationally. The syndicate liked the strip but needed a new title, since a 1930s comic strip already went by Little Folks. The Howdy Doody Show was a hit at the time, and the children in its studio audience were known as the “Peanut gallery.” That’s where the name Peanuts came from.
Seven newspapers grew to more than 2,600
Peanuts started out in seven papers. It went on to appear in more than 2,600, carrying the gang’s daily adventures to readers worldwide for 50 years.
The numbers don’t alter the way it finished. If Schulz had stayed well, he would almost certainly have gone on drawing Peanuts for years more. The ending came from illness: a man telling readers he could no longer meet the schedule, with his family making sure nobody else would continue the strip.
The last strip was still published on Feb. 13. Schulz had died a day earlier, a month after he stopped drawing, leaving Snoopy at the typewriter and Charlie Brown on the phone, telling someone, “No, I think he’s writing…”