lil folks cartoons

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In the late 1940s, young Sparky Schulz wrote and drew “Lil Folks” for the St. Paul Pioneer Press. This was a cartoon feature about a group of VERY precocious children and a pet dog who make whimsical comments about the world they observe.

Sound familiar? You guessed it-it’s the forerunner of PEANUTS.

The story of the transformation of this one-panel cartoon to the more familiar comic strip we know of today is told in this book. Along with that, we get the entire run of “Lil Folks” cartoons. Still not enough? We also see comparisons of “Lil Folks” cartoons to the particular PEANUTS episodes that they would inspire a few years later.

As for “Lil Folks” itself, it’s quite interesting (historical reasons aside) witty, and amusing. Cartoons such as the Patty predecessor pouring a water can over a Charlie Brown prototype from a window while the pre-Charlie Brown says “Rain Rain Go Away, Come again some other day” are simply drawn and presented, but have a surreal and whimsical air about them. In another, a Schroder precursor jumps around the street on both feet while a nearby boy casually says to his friend, “I’ve always admired him-he’s so carefree.” This vision of childhood ranging from the realistically humorous to the bizarre would be carried to new heights as Schulz expanded into PEANUTS in 1950.

The book would seem to be aimed at cartoon historians and hardcore Schulz fantatics, judging by the price and often limited availability of this book (I’ve waited two years before being able to get my copy at an affordable price), but there’s no reason why the casual Peanuts fan would not enjoy this, so the folks at the schulz museum should make this more widely available. Get this with THE COMPLETE PEANUTS 1950-1952 to see the evolution of the most beloved cartoon strip of all time.

source: http://www.amazon.com/