By selectively granting rights of duplication of his characters, Schulz reached an audience far beyond newspaper readers. Over the past few decades, the friends of Charlie Brown and Snoopy have become as ubiquitous in children's bedrooms as Mickey Mouse and Barbie.
About 2,600 newspapers in 75 countries across the world in 21 languages print his "Peanuts'' comic strip, which he began drawing in 1950. Industry experts have called "Peanuts" the most popular comic strip in the world, bar none.
Schulz began drawing a comic strip after discharge from service in World War II. He sold several single-panel comics to The Saturday Evening Post and he began a weekly single-panel comic in the St. Paul (Minn.) Pioneer Press.
An editor at the Universal Feature Syndicate suggested to Schulz that he expand to a strip format, and it first appeared in 1950. He signed a five-year contract and settled upon the name "Peanuts," a name he said he hated.
By 1952, it was popular enough that Rinehart and Co. took the unusual step, for that time, of issuing a selection of the strips in a mass-market paperback.
The "Peanuts'' characters became a marketing phenomenon under Schulz's Creative Associates long before the days of Furby, Pokemon and the Power Rangers.
Things took off in 1961 when a San Francisco housewife asked Schulz if she could create a "Peanuts" calendar.
The characters' images since have appeared on bedsheets, stationery, stuffed toys, games, books, stickers, videos and ads for Metropolitan Life Insurance Co. In 1966, there was even a popular recording titled "Snoopy and the Red Baron" by a band called the Royal Guardsmen.
The 1965 CBS special "A Charlie Brown Christmas," which won an Emmy, is constantly featured on the holiday rerun schedule and other similar specials followed in the same vein. Later, a hit musical, "You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown," became a stage play and was recorded. This story includes information from Staff Researcher Michele Van Hoeck, New York Times and Associated Press.
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