Peanuts by Charles Schulz for May 19, 2013

Why didn’t leave Woodstock in the yellow color we have seen it for the last 40 years?

Maybe because that is not Woodstock. There are often a lot of other birds in this comic strip.

Snoopy is a great friend.

The blue birds of older strips slowly evolved into Woodstock, this one has the trademark crest of fuzzy feathers. Snoopy needed a sidekick but he was slow in arriving.

I think we go through this every weekend strip with birds in it.

snoop could’ve swallowed it alive.

Schulz managed to wonderfully capture the haphazard fluttering of a young bird…very cute.

PTUI!

Hahaha

Growing up with Peanuts, I think Snoopy is the reason I love birds so much

I love the evolution of Snoopy. Some people complain that Peanuts declined in quality after Snoopy became less of a real dog in the 1960s and took over the strip with his WWI pilot, World Famous Attorney, Joe Cool, etc. storylines. I don’t agree. I think that it is just a matter of when you were reading Peanuts as a child. My memories are of Snoopy leading the Beagle Scouts and playing with Rerun.

Speaking of birds…

Can you decipher this?

ACDEDBD ducks?LMNO ducks!OSAR2 ducks!CDEDBD wings?LIBMR ducks!

......

Hey, see the itty bitty ducks?H e double toothpicks, them ain’t no ducks.Oh yes they are too ducks!See the itty bitty wings?Well, I’ll be, them are ducks!

Why does almost everyone keep saying that Woodstock made his first appearance in the strip in 1967? Woodstock first appeared in the 1970 story arc in which Snoopy was chosen to be Head Beagle; Schulz himself said in an interview that Snoopy’s secretary was initially a female bird whom he very soon decided to transform into a male bird, and it was at the point when the bird switched gender that Woodstock truly came to exist. Just because it’s a bird, doesn’t mean that it is Woodstock – otherwise, you might as well say that Woodstock debuted in 1950, as birds were to be seen in the strip even as early as that.

Wikipedia says that Woodstock first appeared in 1967. He was first NAMED in 1970. According to a quote from Schultz, Woodstock was indeed originally a female bird but became a boy around the same time that the name was added: “It was a she and she was Snoopy’s secretary and I was doing secretary jokes quite often so then I thought Woodstock would be a good name for this bird and also, it will get the attention of these people that liked that kind of thing. Suddenly she was not a secretary; she became Woodstock, the boy. It just happened. But that’s what’s good about a comic strip—you can just do it.”

This, I believe, is the first time Schulz has a bird communicating through scratch marks - another step in the evolution to what would become Woodstock, although Schulz himself stated that the first official appearance of Woodstock wasn’t until April 4, 1967.

Here is a link to the April 4 1967 strip.

Woodstock First appearance April 4, 1967 (Comic Strip) (unnamed until June 22, 1970)

I have a color reprint volume, Snoopy and the Peanuts Gang: Shall We Dance?, Ravette (London), 1986, with this strip in it. All the colors are different—-and Woodstock is yellow. So unless someone can turn up a copy of an actual color Sunday strip from May 22nd, 1966 for confirmation or rebuttal…this is Woodstock, and the guys at the syndicate now aren’t checking things.

I think I have this also…that was nice what Snoopy did, eh? wonder what the bird said when he hit the ground?!!!!!

Here’s the link on GoComics. Charles Schulz himself said that Woodstock debuted on April 4, 1967. ‘’For some time, a flock of birds had hung around Snoopy’s house,‘’ Mr. Schulz said. ’’One of them, particularly scatterbrained and clumsy, finally eclipsed the others.’’ According to several websites, April 4, 1967 is the official entrance of what would become known as Woodstock. Birds that came before would remain nameless birds.

wow, i did not remember the year woodstock first appeared. thanks for the info

Perhaps this is Woodstock’s cousin from the Blue Lagoon?