VOYAGES OF IMAGINATION

In this volume, there are occasional omissions of the panel's date from the panel. In those instances, the dates appear in brackets [ ].

p. 1 [January 1, 1961] 11th panel. In the game of bowling, you get two attempts to knock the pins down. The second attempt is the "spare," and "to pick up the spare" is to finish knocking all the pins over on your second try.

p. 3 [January 5, 1961] 4th panel. "The future lies in the soil" is a typical slogan of the "Back to the Land" movement, in which city dwellers rejected the consumerism and hectic pace of modern living and moved back to farms, co-ops, and communes.

p. 3 [January 6 and 7, 1961] These strips reflect withdrawal symptoms experienced by alcoholics and drug addicts.

p. 5 (January 11, 1961) 4th panel. Hyannis Port is a village on Cape Cod, in Massachusetts. It is most famously the home of the Kennedy political family. At the time of this strip John F Kennedy (1917 – 1963) was about to be sworn in as 35th president of the United States, so the village was much in the news and the popular imagination.

p. 10 ( January 22, 1961) 12th panel. Goliath was the Philistine giant defeated by David in the Bible (1 Samuel 17). David took five smooth pebbles from a brook and felled him.

p. 11 (January 24, 1961) 4th panel. In Biblical scholarship, "lower criticism" seeks to establish the accuracy of a text (which may be thousands of years old and in many different versions) while "higher criticism" seeks the author’s meaning in a historical context.

p. 14 (January 30, 1961) 2nd and 3rd panels. These are the grand totals of all the gifts given in the carol "The Twelve Days of Christmas."

p. 14 (February 1, 1961) 2nd panel. Calcium, the mineral essential to strong bones, is indeed healthy, but is not found in the air. It is usually found in milk products.

p. 17 (February 8, 1961) 2nd panel. "Pasteurization" is the process of heating milk to eliminate bacteria. It was not named after a pasture (a grass-covered land where animals graze), but Dr. Louis Pasteur (1822 – 1895), who invented it.

p. 21 (February 16, 1961) 1st panel and following. Linus is wearing a reproduction Civil War (1861 – 1865) era hat known as a kepi. 1961 marked The Centennial (100 year anniversary) of the Civil War. There was a brief fashion for these hats, but they failed to become as popular as the Davy Crockett raccoon caps of 1957. The boys will be wearing them through this year's strips. By July 8 Snoopy will already be tired of it. (See p. 81, July 8, 1961 below)

p. 48 (April 21, 1961) 4th panel. Dr. Seuss was the pen name of Theodore Geissel (1904 – 1991), prolific and well-loved author of many children's books, including The Cat in the Hat (1957), How the Grinch Sole Christmas! (1957), and Horton Hears a Who (1954).

p. 53 (May 3, 1961) 4th panel. The "walking wounded" are people who are injured, but not so badly that they cannot walk around.

p. 60 (May 19, 1961) 4th panel. The hydrogen (or "H") bomb was an even more destructive atomic bomb than the ones dropped on Japan in World War II. 1961 was the middle of Cold War, an era of tensions between the United States and the USSR, who also possessed atomic (later nuclear) weapons.

p. 63 (May 26, 1961) 4th panel. A sandbagger is one who pretends to be weaker than he really he is at a particular sport or game, usually in order to trick his opponent into a false sense of security. Here, Snoopy accuses Faron the cat of doing it for a free ride because he's lazy.

p. 64 (May 28, 1961) 1st and 2nd panels. As part of the Civil War Centennial, Linus is singing a tune by George F. Root (1820 - 1895), "Just before the battle, mother" (circa 1860), which begins

Just before the battle, mother,
I am thinking most of you,
While upon the field we're watching
With the enemy in view.
Comrades brave are 'round me lying,
Filled with thoughts of home and God
For well they know that on the morrow,
Some will sleep beneath the sod.

p. 75 (June 22 - 24, 1961) That little girl is Caroline Bouvier Kennedy (3 years old at the time), the daughter of president John F. Kennedy, who had been sworn into office just a few months earlier, January 20, 1961. (Note: Does anyone know if Schulz is referring to a particular picture, perhaps one in LIFE or TIME magazine?). The Kennedys were quite wealthy.

p. 81 (July 8, 1961) The boys are singing three Civil War era songs. In the 1st panel Charlie Brown is singing "The Battle Cry of Freedom" (1862) by George F. Root, which begins:

Yes, we'll rally round the flag boys, we'll rally once again,
Shouting the battle cry of freedom,
We will rally from the hillside, we'll gather from the plain,
Shouting the battle cry of freedom!
The Union forever! Hurrah, boys, hurrah!
Down with the traitors, up with the stars;
While we rally round the flag, boys, rally once again,
Shouting the battle cry of freedom!
This was a very popular song in the North during the Civil War.

2nd panel. Against all expectations, we get not another Northern song, but a Southern Civil War tune. Schroeder is singing Harry McCarthy’s "The Bonnie Blue Flag" (1861), which, in its time, was second in popularity only to Daniel Emmett's (1815 - 1904) "Dixie."

We are a band of brothers
And native to the soil
Fighting for our liberty
With treasure blood, and toil
And when our rights were threatened,
The cry rose near and far
Hurrah for the Bonnie Blue Flag
That bears a single star!

The song is actually about the flag of Texas, but that “Lone Star” flag was raised over the capital building in Jackson, Mississippi as a way of signaling succession.

Linus continues with Root’s, "Just before the battle, mother." (See p. 64, May 28, 1961 above)

p. 84 (July 15, 1961) 4th panel. Until around the 1990s, meals at restaurants were frequently garnished with a sprig of parsley. Supposedly, one could chew it after the meal to freshen one's breath. Few people did.

p. 86 (July 18, 1961) 3rd panel. Linus is doing his impersonation of Bella Lugosi's (1882 - 1956) version of Dracula, from the 1931 version of the vampire film. Lugosi's use of the cape made it signature vampire cliché.

p. 90 (July 28, 1961) 4th panel. Again the Cold War. The USSR and its client nations were communist: believers in communal sharing of property. The USA was (and is) capitalist. The Cold War officially ended with the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. The USSR broke up shortly thereafter, and Russia is slowly becoming more capitalistic. The U.S. won the race.

p. 96 [August 10, 1961] 4th panel. "What the market will bear" is an economics term. Essentially, the price of a good or service will rise and people will continue paying for it, unless / until the price gets so high that people stop. As long as Lucy and Linus are not "too expensive" (nice to their babysitter), the babysitter will "buy them" (let them stay up late).

p. 98 (August 14, 1961) 4th panel. Snoopy feels like a horse that's been roped. He's saying things a horse might say.

p. 101 (August 21, 1961) 2nd panel. David Ratner, Paul Olsen, and George Letness were friends and co-workers of Schulz's at Art Instruction, Inc. in Minneapolis, where Schulz started working in 1946.

p. 102 (August 25, 1961) 1st panel. "Clam diggers" are pants that did not go all the way down to your ankles. Clams live in fairly shallow water. In theory, you could wade into clam beds, and while your ankles would get wet, your pants would not -– because the fabric was a couple of inches above the water. Clam diggers were a fashion statement, but there are clams in Minnesota (where I assume Peanuts takes place). You can even buy the Field Guide to the Freshwater Mussels of Minnesota.

p. 105 (September 1, 1961) 1st panel. Miss Othmar was named for a friend of Schulz's in Santa Rosa, Othmar Jarish.

p. 107 (September 4, 1961) 3rd panel. "Um Pa Pa" is the stereotype of the sound of German music due to the emphasis on horns. The joke is that Snoopy has paws, so his music is "Um Paw Paw." See also Snoopy's "Pawpet" -- instead of "Puppet" -- shows in later years.

p. 107 (September 5, 1961) 2nd panel. Haphephobia is actually the fear of being touched.

p. 110 (September 13, 1961) 4th panel. Linus is talking into a reel-to-reel tape recorder. Some psychiatrists recorded their sessions with patients instead of taking notes on paper.

p. 116 (September 25, 1961) 4th panel. "The agency" is the advertising agency that Linus assumes has been hired to promote National Dog Week (started in 1928, but given a real boost in popularity in 1960 when The Pet Food Institute took over and was able to promote it with more substantial financial backing). Not only is there a nice, big sign, but a real dog is holding the advertisement.

p. 121 [October 8, 1961] 10th panel. Blackbeard was the nickname of notorious pirate Edward Teach (1680 – 1718). He was also known for his great many wives.

p. 122 (October 9, 1961) 1st and 4th panels. Stamped out means eradicated. Lucy is taking the term too literally. Malpractice insurance pays a patient if a doctor's treatments harm him. Not only is Linus not sure this will work, he wonders if it might hurt him.

p. 125 (October 17, 1961) 4th panel. Wild salmon (and some other fish) swim upstream in order to spawn. It is very hard work.

p. 134 (November 8, 1961) 4th panel. "Speed reading" was popularized by Evelyn Wood (1909 - 1995) in 1959. In her Reading Dynamics program, you move your hand across a book’s page. This helps with concentration. Some people claim to be able to read 1,000 or more words per minute. President Kennedy was known to be a speed reader. Speed reading faded from popularity in the 1980s.

p. 137 (November 14, 1961) 4th panel. Again, did Snoopy actually pick up the ball and drop it before he kicked it -- thus making a real punt -- or did he just kick a ball that was lying around? We may never know. (See also p. 272, September 24, 1962 and p. 294, November 17, 1962 below)

p. 137 (November 15, 1961) 1st panel. To be "ahead of your time" is to have ideas that the world will eventually view as valuable, but that go unrecognized in your own time. For example, Leonardo da Vinci's (1452 - 1519) mechanical designs were ahead of their time because the material and other technology necessary to build them would not exist for another half a century. Linus should have simply said, "I think I'm early."

p. 139 [November 19, 1961] 8th panel. The first appearance of the little red-haired girl. She is based on Donna Mae Johnson, Schulz's girlfriend in St. Paul during the late 1940s. She was an accountant at Art Instruction Schools, Inc. where Schulz worked as a cartoon letterer. She broke his heart when, in 1950, she married Al Wold, whom she had known since eighth grade.

p. 145 (December 3, 1961) 11th panel. To "keep your ear to the ground" means to pay very close attention to what's going on around you.

p. 148 (December 10, 1961) 10th panel. This is a paraphrase of the Biblical phrase "A soft answer turneth away wrath" found in Proverbs 15:1.

p. 150 (December 14, 1961) 1st panel. "Git" is Violet's mis-spoken "Get."

p. 164 (January 15, 1962) 4th panel. Suburbs are cities that have grown up around larger cities. Since the area around cities was frequently undeveloped ("the country"), all it took was a few houses to turn that into "the suburbs." All it takes for the area around Snoopy's lone doghouse to feel crowded is one more inhabitant -– the snowman.

p. 165 (January 20, 1962) 4th panel. A "fair weather friend" is one who is your friend only when things are going well for you. Fair weather is also bright and sunny, which melts snow.

p. 168 (January 27, 1962) 4th panel. Coal is a rock burned for heat or to power generators. Actually, Linus probably does know what coal is. He's made plenty of snowmen of his own. The joke here is that it's the 1960s and most of the household uses of coal (cooking, heating) have been replaced by piped-in gas and electricity, which are more modern.

p. 169 (January 28, 1962) 9th panel. Snoopy is dressed as the great fictional detective Sherlock Holmes, created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1859 – 1930). The calabash pipe and deerstalker hat were made famous by Basil Rathbone's (1892 – 1967) portrayal of Holmes in a series of films from 1939 to 1946. Snoopy is tracking down rabbits like Holmes would track down criminals.

p. 171 (February 2, 1962) 2nd and 4th panels. One's "golden years" are usually when one is mature, retired, and enjoying the fruits of one's labors. If gold, which is very expensive, represents age and maturity, then the opposite of that, youth, would be represented by the much less expensive metal of copper.

p. 204 (April 19, 1962) 4th panel. Many fabrics you buy are "pre-shrunk," meaning that they will stay the same size even after being washed and dried. Any tendency they might have to shrink has already been expressed out of them by washing and drying them before offering them for sale. Prior to this marketing move, many people would buy clothes a size or two larger than they needed on the understanding that it would shrink a (some unknown amount) when washed and dried.

p. 204 (April 20, 1962) 2nd and 4th panels. To be myopic is to be near-sighted. Charlie Brown has confused that with "psychic" (having the ability to tell the future).

p. 204 (April 21, 1962) 4th panel. Snoopy has put on the glasses to make him look serious and professional.

p. 208 (April 29, 1962) 1st panel. Dinner music is music played in the background at restaurants while people eat.

p. 209 (April 30, 1962) 4th panel. "It'll never go" means "It will never be a success or continue."

p. 211 (May 6, 1962) Two jokes in this strip. First, it takes a long time for Charlie Brown's bowling ball to make it down the alley. This is because he's not very strong, and so he can't put much power behind it. Second (14th panel), a 7 – 10 split (where all of the middle pins have been knocked down, leaving only the extreme left (7) and right (10)standing) happens rather frequently, so Snoopy is miffed at being woken up to see something so commonplace.

p. 212 (May 8, 1962) 1st panel. "A pretty girl is like a melody" is a 1919 tune by famed composer Irving Berlin (1888 – 1989).

p. 214 [May 13, 1962] 2nd and 3rd panels. In the game of bowling, a perfect score is 300. A 100 means that Charlie Brown has knocked down 1/3 of all of his pins -– OK, but not that great. A good kid score. In the sport of boxing bantamweight is the class for fighters who weigh between 112 – 118 pounds. It's the least-significant class and not very impressive or important (quick, name any Bantamweight Champion of the World). Charlie Brown is a "lightweight" in the world of bowling.

p. 233 (June 25, 1962) 2nd panel. Candlestick Park is/was a sports stadium in San Francisco. It is the home of the 49ers football and Giants baseball teams. Built on Candlestick Point, it held its name from 1960 to 1996, when the 3Com Corporation bought the naming rights for several million dollars. Since 2004 it has been named Monster Park, for the A/V cable manufacturer.

p. 234 (June 28, 1962) 4th panel. On May 24, 1962, the USS Intrepid retrieved Mercury astronaut Commander Scott Carpenter (b. 1925) from the Atlantic Ocean after his Aurora 7 capsule overshot its splashdown site by 250 miles and sank.

p. 235 (July 1, 1962) 9th panel. Snoopy is holding a shepherd's crook. The traditional emblem of a shepherd, it was used to gently pull sheep by the neck to take them away from someplace they should not be. The implication being that he now has a flock of (grass eating) sheep to keep the grass low.

p. 237 (July 5, 1962) 4th panel. A scapegoat is someone to blame when things go wrong. The word comes from the practice of sacrificing a goat to appease the gods when bad things (like failed crops) occurred.

p. 241 (July 15, 1962) 10th panel. Snoopy is playing it cool. "Think nothing of it," he says, perhaps sarcastically. And yet he intends to report Linus to The Humane Society for the (inhumane) action of standing on a dog's head.

p. 253 (August 12, 1962) 9th panel. You look down the barrel of a gun when it is pointed right at your head. The implication is that Lucy's fist is as scary and potentially deadly as a gun.

p. 257 (August 21 1962) 4th panel. During the 1950s and 60s, there was a draft (forced military conscription). Your likelihood of being drafted depended on a random lottery based on your birthday. Draftees served two years in the military. But you could get a deferment (meaning you were excused from service) if your number came up as long as you were a full-time student. This was because the nation didn't want to lose its next generation of leaders and thinkers. So the irony here is that Sally wants a deferment out of school.

p. 264 (September 8, 1962) 4th panel. Knute Rockne (1888 – 1931) was a famous football player and coach and so would have appreciated Snoopy's punting prowess.

p. 270 (September 22, 1962) One way to score a field goal in the game of football is to kick it between the goal posts -– as Snoopy is emulating.

p. 272 (September 24, 1962) 3rd panel. Actually Snoopy is not punting. He’s just kicking. (See p. 137, November 14, 1961 above and p. 294, November 17, 1962 below)

p. 272 (September 25, 1962) 4th panel. Bursitis is an inflammation at the joints that makes movement painful. It usually afflicts older people, though it can occur in children who play a lot of sports. (See also vol. 7, March 4, 1964, p. 184)

p. 281 (October 15, 1962) 1st panel. Dr. Jonas Salk's (1914 - 1995) vaccine against the crippling disease polio was in wide use by 1955. It prevented most of the complications of polio, but not the disease itself. Dr. Albert Sabin's (1906 - 1993) vaccine, which could be taken orally as opposed to through a shot, prevented the actual disease. Widespread vaccinations began in the U.S in 1961.

p. 282 (October 18, 1962) 2nd panel. Before there were photocopy machines, there were stencils. Readers who went to school then will recall Mimeographs, which were an advanced form of stencil. You simply drew or typed on the white surface of the stencil and then ran the machine through a drum which copied the text onto paper, making copies. In the 1960s the process was more complex, involving doing your writing or drawing backwards onto a block of gelatin and pressing paper by hand against that to produce copies.

p. 290 (October 6, 1962) 4th panel. "Coming through the rye" is a poem by Scottish poet Robert Burns (1759 – 1796). It’s a reference to two people meeting in the tall grass.

p. 293 (October 12, 1962) 4th panel. Just like Michael Jordan (b. 1963) basketball shoes today, sports paraphernalia have long had the brands of famous players. Only here it’s for environmentalist Rachel Carson (1907 - 1964). Carson’s book, Silent Spring, published a few months earlier, exposed the dangers of pesticides, specifically the now-banned DDT.

p. 294 (November 17, 1962) 3rd panel. The difference between punting and kicking off is that in the latter, the ball is solidly on the field (See p. 137, November 14, 1961 above and p. 272, September 24, 1962 above)

p. 306 (December 14, 1962) 4th panel. In golf a handicap is the number of extra strokes a player is allowed. If I have an 18 handicap, then I get an extra stroke that is not counted on each of the holes. It is an attempt to level the playing field.

p. 307 [December 16, 1962] 6th panel. Schroeder is singing the first part of "The Ode to Joy" from German composer Ludwig van Beethoven's (1707 - 1827) Ninth Symphony: "Friends, no more these sad tunes . . ."

p. 309 (December 22, 1962) 4th panel. In the 1962 World Series, during the seventh game, bottom of the ninth, with two outs and runners on second and third base, the New York Yankees led 1-0. Willie McCovey (b. 1938) of the San Francisco Giants hit a line drive that was caught by Yankee Bobby Richardson (b. 1935). Had it been out of Richardson's reach, the Giants would have won.

P. 310 [December 23, 1962] The Dead Sea Scrolls are ancient texts written on papyrus and parchment approximately two thousand years ago. They were discovered in the 1950s on the West Bank of the Jordan River in the Middle East. They contain many texts from the Old Testament, Torah commentaries, and documents from Jewish religious sects of the time. The bulk of the documents were translated and published between 1950 – 56.