St. Paul, Minnesota, mayor Norm Coleman visits Bemidji, Minnesota, on August 23, 2001, bringing along one of the 102 "Charlie Brown Around Town" statues that grace the streets of St. Paul.
Coleman was promoting the celebration that runs September 8-16 in St. Paul. (AP photo/The Pioneer of Bemidji/Monte Draper)
These articles are arranged from the most recent down, so you'll always find the newest news about Charlie Brown and his friends toward the top; older articles will be located further down, or on previous pages.
Coleman calls off Peanuts tribute
September 14, 2001
The Minneapolis Star Tribune
ST. PAUL (AP) -- In light of the recent terrorist attacks in New York and Washington, St. Paul Mayor Norm Coleman has called off a Sunday celebration of Charlie Brown.
The "Charlie Brown Around Town Blockhead Party" will be postponed a week until Sept. 23. The celebration was to culminate a summer-long tribute, which included statues scattered across town, to the beloved " Peanuts" character created by hometown cartoonist Charles Schulz.
In its place, Coleman encouraged people to attend a statewide memorial on the state Capitol lawn at 3 p.m. Sunday for the victims of the recent tragedy.
Charlie Brown events scheduled for Saturday will take place as planned.
Wall painted by Schulz arrives
50-year-old mural heads to storage until it is placed in Charles M. Schulz Museum and Research Center
September 11, 2001
By Chris Smith
The Santa Rosa Press Democrat
The kid's-room wall that Charles Schulz enlivened with cartoon figures 50 years ago in Colorado arrived safely in Santa Rosa on Monday.
"This is the largest and most generous contribution yet," said Ruth Gardner Begell, director of the partially built Charles M. Schulz Museum and Research Center. The 8-foot-by-12-foot wall will remain in storage in its specially made crate until early next year, when it will be placed in a prominent spot in the museum adjacent to Schulz's Redwood Empire Ice Arena.
The wall was donated by a retired couple, Stan and Polly Travnicek, the longtime owners of a small stucco house in Colorado Springs. Schulz and his young family lived in the house for a short time a half century ago.
The cartoonist painted pictures on the wall in 1951, the year after the premiere of his newly syndicated comic strip, "Peanuts." The room belonged then to his stepdaughter, Meredith, who at the time wasn't yet 2 years old.
The mural is prized by the Schulz museum staff because of the personal nature of the artwork, and because it features early renditions of characters -- chiefly Charlie Brown and Snoopy -- that evolved and matured as Schulz did.
The Minnesota-born cartoonist was 29 and largely unknown when he painted the wall in Meredith's room. Against a chocolate-brown background he painted likenesses of Peanuts characters and a variety of cartoon animals, stars and music notes.
At the bottom, Schulz painted a small, pink door. Stepdaughter Meredith Hodges was swept back in time when she visited the Travniceks last Friday, the day the cut-away wall was pulled free, and looked at the mural for the first time in five decades.
"The things I remembered were the picture of Snoopy running, and the little door on the bottom," said Hodges, 51, now a resident of Loveland, Colo.
"I think I might have asked Dad to put the door there," she said. She vaguely recalls standing before the picture of the door and wondering what was beyond it, and why she couldn't get through it.
Hodges said perhaps that little door is the explanation for "why I was so adamant about getting through closed doors all my life."
The Travniceks learned that Charles Schulz had once lived in their house after they bought it in 1979. Polly Travnicek worked for nearly three months rubbing away the four coats of paint that covered his artwork.
She and her husband offered to donate the wall to Schulz's museum before he died at his Santa Rosa home early in 2000. Museum Director Begell said that cutting away, packing, shipping and replacing the wall will cost less than $100,000.
Mayor Coleman Welcomes All 102 Charlie Brown Statues to Downtown Saint Paul
September 9, 2001
PRN Newswire
ST. PAUL, Minnesota -- Mayor Norm Coleman will preside over festivities this weekend in celebration of the mass gathering of all of the Charlie Brown Statues into downtown Saint Paul. The 102 statues are part of the city's summer-long Charlie Brown Around Town tribute to native son Charles M. Schulz. Today the Mayor will unveil the 102nd statue recently completed by renowned artist Tom Everhart. Everhart is the only other artist ever licensed to draw the Peanuts characters.
The five-foot-tall statues have been scattered throughout the city streets since early June. As with last year's Peanuts on Parade event featuring Snoopy statues, all of the one-of-a-kind statues are being brought downtown to Saint Paul's Wabasha Street for a final series of community parties and events. The Charlie Brown statues will remain downtown thru September 16, after which they will begin moving out to the Mall of America (Bloomington, MN) in preparation for the September 30 live auction conducted by Sotheby's.
"This summer has exceeded our greatest expectations. It's been an absolutely incredible summer, once again, in Saint Paul," declared Mayor Norm Coleman.
An estimated 450,000 people from all corners of the globe visited Saint Paul last year to see the Snoopy statues. Officials believe this year's totals will be even higher. At the Information Doghouse, sponsored by the Saint Paul Convention and Visitors Bureau, visitors can sign a guest book when picking up Charlie Brown maps and information. Officials report visitors from all 50 states and at least 53 countries have come to see the beloved Charlie Brown.
As with last year's event, all proceeds raised through the sponsorship of the statues will go towards the permanent bronze Peanuts Gang sculpture to be installed in downtown Saint Paul, as well as to scholarship programs at the Art Instruction School in Minneapolis and the College of Visual Arts in Saint Paul. The permanent sculpture is scheduled to be completed and unveiled in 2002.
Additional "Charlie Brown Around Town" information can be found on the www.ilovestpaul.com Web site or via the Charlie Brown hotline at (651) 266-8989.
Storm sends nighttime surprise to Missouri couple
September 8, 2001
By Matt Campbell
The Kansas City Star
The storm was howling through the trees outside as Jim and Shirley Minnis watched a weather bulletin Friday night, snug in their home just outside Chillicothe, Mo.
The forecaster warned of high winds and rain. But a rogue balloon?
"The wind was blowing awful hard, and I was in the kitchen," said Jim Minnis, who runs a burial vault company with his wife from their home on Route V. "I heard a scraping, rubbing sound that you don't ordinarily hear. Something was happening that wasn't normal."
It was a cold call from a life insurance company -- albeit a little late at just before 10 p.m.
A MetLife blimp that was supposed to hover over Arrowhead Stadium today broke loose from its mooring at Downtown Airport shortly after 8 p.m. in winds approaching 60 mph.
The grinning visage of the comic-strip dog Snoopy peered down eerily amid lightning flashes as the 2-ton-plus blimp drifted, unpiloted, across northwest Missouri. It landed on the Minnises' property.
"I stepped out on the patio behind the house," said Jim Minnis. "I got a pin oak tree, and I could see this big white thing out behind it."
At first Minnis thought the wind had uplifted a machine shed about 60 feet out in his yard. He stood in the rain trying to make it out.
"In just a minute, I noticed it moved. I said, 'No, that's a balloon!' "
All 130 feet of it, by this time partly deflated.
"The bottom part where people sit had got hung up on my fence, and that had kind of stopped it," said Minnis. "The balloon kind of raised up and swung around and hit the north side of the shed. Then it started east and hit a tree and then another shed."
The blimp finally came to rest atop a company truck that Minnis uses to haul his backhoe. It mashed the fender and a door, and it broke a window. The sheds got banged up a bit, too.
By this time Shirley Minnis, also having heard noises, was at the door. Her husband, fearing that people were in the airship's damaged gondola, shouted for her to call 911.
No one was aboard, and no one was injured in the incident.
Soon the Livingston County Sheriff's Department was on the scene as well as the Missouri Highway Patrol. The dark countryside about 60 miles northeast of Kansas City lighted up with activity.
Crews loaded the limp blimp into rental trucks and hauled it away about 530 a.m. Saturday.
The Federal Aviation Administration was looking into the matter. But it appears to have been simply a storm casualty.
Workers at Downtown Airport who were scrambling to protect planes reported that the blimp was straining against its mooring mast in the center of the airfield. The mast snapped, and the helium-filled balloon was gone with the wind.
Air traffic controllers monitored the blimp's journey. A built-in safety mechanism designed to release the gas meant the balloon would not travel too far. It also is designed to deflate if it reaches 10,000 feet.
The blimp was one of two that carry the MetLife logo and pictures of Snoopy as a World War I flying ace. It is operated by High Degree Operations of Oldsmar, Fla.
A spokesman for High Degree said it was unlikely the blimp would be used for today's football game.
"We don't know for sure until we completely assess the damage, but I don't believe that we'll make the game," Bob Reisen said Saturday afternoon. He said that even if the blimp did not appear to be severely damaged it would have to be checked carefully to make sure all its internal systems were working.
Metropolitan Life Insurance Co. officials could not be reached.
Blimp goes on windy ride from KC to Chillicothe
September 8, 2001
By John Shultz and Deann Smith
The Kansas City Star
Oh, the humility.
It wasn't exactly the Hindenburg disaster, but Kansas City had its own brush with inflatable infamy Friday night when the MetLife blimp tore loose from its moorings in a wind gust at the Downtown Airport and drifted away.
And Snoopy, adorning 4,400 pounds of floating MetLife advertisement, had no interest in coming home.
The blimp was in town to shoot aerials for Sunday afternoon's Chiefs/Raiders contest. It floated two hours and a respectable 50 to 60 miles before coming to rest on a pickup truck just northeast of Chillicothe, Mo., the Federal Aviation Administration reported.
Dustin Gooding and an Executive Beechcraft co-worker at Downtown Airport were towing a plane to a hangar to protect it from the high winds just after 8 p.m. when the blimp made a break for it. None of the blimp crew members was aboard at the time.
"It rolled over and it just floated away backward," Gooding said. "It was bouncing around there pretty good."
Joe McBride, spokesman for Kansas City's airports, said the 20-foot mooring mast cracked in the wind and, despite efforts of the craft's handlers, the blimp was airborne quickly.
The National Weather Service reported gusts of at least 60 mph at the airport.
McBride said the incident made some people nervous.
"We don't like having an air traffic safety hazard out there," McBride said. "This is a fairly new one on me."
Tony Molinaro, spokesman for the FAA's central regional office, said agency investigators were headed to the crash site Friday night and would assess the scene this morning.
"Everybody's OK; I can't speak for the truck," Molinaro said.
He said FAA officials, from the agency's Kansas City regional center in Olathe, had tracked the blimp's journey. Air controllers, he said, knew the blimp wouldn't go too far It's equipped with a safety mechanism that causes a loss of helium if no one is at the controls, limiting flights to 60 to 80 miles.
McBride said the blimp's handlers, from a company called High Degree Operations out of Tampa, Fla., were responsible for keeping the craft under control while they rented space at the airport.
The great blimp chase was one bit of drama in an otherwise routine summer storm. Power lines and trees were scattered across the area, and Kansas City Power & Light Co. reported about six blown circuits.
A witness at the airport recalled that about 10 persons were in the company's terminal watching the blimp being buffeted by the storm.
"Everyone was yelling, 'The blimp is loose, the blimp is loose!' " he said. "Half were crowding the windows to see it and half ran outside. People were just in shock."
According to MetLife's Web site, since the maiden voyage in 1987, MetLife blimps have provided aerial coverage for a variety of televised events.
The blimp's crew has 14 members two pilots and a 12-member ground crew. At least one crew member monitors the ship 24 hours a day. Crew members include electronic engineers, mechanics and licensed radio technicians and riggers.
Preserving Peanuts
September 7, 2001
By Mark Arnest
Colorado Springs Gazette
When Stanley and Polly Travnicek bought their modest home north of downtown in 1979, neighbors told them it harbored a secret A nursery wall -- long since painted over -- contained figures painted by Charles Schulz.
Schulz, creator of the "Peanuts" comic strip, painted them for his daughter during the brief time he had lived in Colorado Springs in 1951.
Polly Travnicek spent nearly three months painstakingly removing several layers of paint covering Schulz's oil-based paintings, revealing a priceless bit of "Peanuts" memorabilia, including Charlie Brown, Snoopy and Patty as well as non-"Peanuts" images ranging from an elephant to a smiling train engine to a tree.
Now the wall is headed for Santa Rosa, California, where it will be one of the centerpieces of the Charles M. Schulz Museum when the museum opens in spring 2002.
"We've always felt it belonged to the family," Polly Travnicek said Thursday. The Travniceks offered the wall to the museum a few months before Schulz's death from cancer in February 2000, but it was only this summer that the museum made plans to move it.
As the wall was prepared Thursday for removal today, neighbors stopped by to say goodbye to it, and several of the workmen brought their families to take a last look.
"This old fir is harder than a rock," said drywall specialist Don Parker as he worked on loosening the wall from the foundation. "But it should come out easy once we get it loose."
The approximately 12-by-8-foot wall presents plenty of challenges for the movers. It's an exterior wall, but it's not a load-bearing wall. And it's constructed of an early drywall, not lath and plaster.
"Lime plasters are stronger but also much heavier and more brittle," said Molly Lambert, the Berkeley-based conservator who will help preserve the wall during removal and get it into its specially built padded frame. "There's very little danger of disintegration."
Lambert is just one of a battery of people involved in the project. Overseeing the project is Gianna Capecci, collections manager for the Charles M. Schulz Museum. There are the workers from Art C. Klein Construction, the local contractor that's removing and replacing the wall, and a dedicated truck -- with climate control, air-ride suspension and two drivers -- to get it to Santa Rosa.
There the wall will join a collection that includes 7,000 original drawings and such Schulz memorabilia as his studio and reference books. Capecci said the wall may be free-standing in a gallery devoted to Schulz's personal life.
Schulz drew the "Peanuts" strip - originally titled "Li'l Folks" - for more than 50 years. It appeared in more than 2,000 newspapers worldwide, making its shy, soft-spoken creator the most widely read and highest-paid cartoonist in history.
Capecci thinks the comic strip's enduring appeal stems from "the gentleness and kindness of his philosophy."
For the inconvenience of having a temporary hole carved in their home and workers tramping around for days, the Travniceks will get a replacement wall, a trip to the museum's opening ceremonies - and, said Polly Travnicek, "lots of gratification, knowing that Mr. Schulz's paintings are exactly where they ought to be."
Snoopy Is on the Move
September 7, 2001
11 p.m. News, KKTV Channel 11
Snoopy and Charlie Brown are on their way across the country. The Charles Schulz characters once graced a wall of a Colorado Springs home. The wall is now on its way to a museum in Santa Rosa, California. It's all thanks to a local couple, whose dream, like Schulz, is to make people smile.
Stan and Pauline Travnicek own a house that Schulz and his family once lived in. Schulz painted the 8' x 12' wall in 1951. It includes images of Snoopy when he still bounded around on all fours and Charlie Brown jumping over a candlestick. Pauline worked for 3 months to remove four coats of paint that covered the famed characters. Now, the Travnicek's are donating the entire wall to a new museum being built to honor the cartoon strip creator.
In the Friday morning drizzle Snoppy, Charlie and Patty were suddenly on the move, after living in the same place for 50 years. A special climate controlled mover pulled up to the home. Contractors gently pulled the wall away and hoped their preparatory work held.
Pauline says, "It's going to be worth it. We'll go out there and see it, all in a display and we'll know that we made a difference."
Construction on the Charles M. Schulz Museum and Research Center began in May 2000. It is slated to open Spring 2002. The 27,000-foot facility will include permanent and changing exhibit spaces, an auditorium with 100 seats, classroom space and a research library and archives. For more information on the museum visit www.CharlesMSchulzMuseum.org.
Wall of fame
In 1951, 'Sparky' Schulz drew a mural in his home for his first baby -- Now a Colorado couple is donating that wall to the Charles M. Schulz Museum
September 7, 2001
By Chris Smith
The Santa Rosa Press Democrat
Today in Colorado, workers with a large crate and a larger truck will pack up an artifact destined for the late Charles Schulz's partially constructed Santa Rosa museum.
Polly and Stan Travnicek of Colorado Springs are donating an entire wall from their TV room.
The 8-by-12-foot wall is museum-quality because back in 1951 a young "Sparky" Schulz, just starting out as a syndicated funnies-page artist, adorned it with a mural for his first baby, Meredith.
Among the characters on the wall are Charlie Brown, jumping over a candlestick. His beagle, Snoopy, is shown walking on all fours, as he did in the early days of the "Peanuts" comics that would grow into the most famous strip in the world.
Schulz and his first wife, Joyce, lived only briefly in the little stucco house on Colorado Springs' North El Paso Street. After they moved -- first back to their home state of Minnesota and then west to Sonoma County -- subsequent tenants painted over the mural.
The painting had been covered up for nearly three decades when the Travniceks bought the house in 1979. They learned that Charles M. Schulz, by that time world renowned, had lived there long before and had painted a mural on a particular bedroom wall.
Polly Travnicek, now 74, decided in '79 it was worth a try to free it from beneath the layers of interior latex. But first she needed to know what kind of paint Schulz used, lest she damage the mural while trying to restore it.
Travnicek, a retired telephone operator, phoned Schulz's Santa Rosa studio 22 years ago and told an assistant to the cartoonist what she was hoping to do with the wall.
"His secretary said, 'That is so neat. He's right here and I'll let you talk to him.'"
Schulz came on the line and cheerfully recalled how he used oil paints to create the baby's mural. He wished her luck in uncovering it.
An amateur artist herself, Travnicek all those years ago took to the interior paint with cotton balls dipped in Red Devil Sanding Liquid. She took on the 96 square feet of old paint, four layers deep, one square inch at a time.
"It took me nearly three months to get it off," she said.
It was a grand day when she dabbed away the last of the latex. She examined her treasure Against a chocolate-brown background, Schulz had painted the alphabet across the top of the wall, a moon and stars, musical notes, Charlie Brown and Snoopy and Patty, and a host of other characters -- a toothy rabbit, a smiling train, a red fox, a duck, a big-mouthed fish, a butterfly.
Travnicek and her husband, a retired auto mechanic, rented out the house from 1979 until 1987. To protect the Schulz mural, Stan Travnicek, now 80, carefully bolted paneling over it.
When the couple moved into the house in '87, they uncovered the mural and turned the room into their den and TV room.
Polly Travnicek said that when they learned late in 1999 that Schulz, then ailing with cancer, was going to build a museum in Santa Rosa, they knew they had to offer up the mural.
"We have never really felt like it belonged to us, so we want to give it to the museum," she said.
Schulz was 77 when he died of complications of cancer at his Santa Rosa home on Feb. 12, 2000. His family and the staff of the Charles M. Schulz Museum and Research Center, being built adjacent to his ice arena on West Steele Lane, accepted the Travniceks' offer.
Schulz's eldest daughter, Meredith Hodges, now a resident of Loveland, Colo., will be back in Colorado Springs today for the wall's removal. She'll be accompanied on the sentimental journey by brother Craig Schulz of Santa Rosa and sister Amy Johnson of Utah.
Museum director Ruth Gardner Begell, the museum director, and Gianna Capecci, the collections manager, also will be at the Travnicek home today to oversee the packing away of the wall.
"It's already loose and ready to be taken out," Polly Travnicek said by phone Thursday.
"They have a crate built out on the driveway. The girls from the museum are making soft pillow things to put around it the wall to protect it."
Begell said the wall, weighing only about 500 pounds because the exterior stucco has been chipped off, will be placed in the specially made crate and loaded onto a fine-art shipping truck.
A camera crew for "The Today Show" will be on hand this morning to shoot live coverage of the operation.
The truck is scheduled to arrive at the museum in Santa Rosa on Monday. Begell has invited the Travniceks to be honored guests at the grand opening of the museum next spring.
The wall will be a permanent exhibit. Polly Travnicek said she and Stan will be thrilled to come.
As soon as the wall is trucked away today, a construction crew hired by the museum will begin work on a replacement wall. Total cost of the project was not available.
Polly Travnicek said she'll miss the Schulz pictures, but Stan will build some light oak shelves and drawers on the new wall and it be nice to have some more storage space.
Peanuts creator Schulz's mural going home
September 6, 2001
KXRM Channel 21
A piece of history, discovered under a layer of paint on a wall in a Springs home, is leaving Colorado. Peanuts creator Charles Schulz, who lived in the Springs in 1951, created a mural on the wall of his daughter's bedroom.
The schulz family moved out, another family moved in and painted over the mural. But when the Travniceks bought the home more than 20 years ago, a neighbor told them about the hidden treasure. They uncovered the mural in 1979 and have enjoyed it for years. But when Schultz was diagnosed with cancer in 1999, the Travniceks wanted to donate the mural to a museum honoring Schultz. "We've shown the wall to thousands of people, but it will be shown to millions out there. We just feel that's where the wall belongs."
The mural wall will be moved to Santa Rosa, California tomorrow where the museum is located. One of Schultz' daughters and three of his granddaughters are here to watch transportation of the wall.
Schultz died February twelfth of last year. The day before his final original Peanuts Sunday comic was printed in newspapers across the country.
St. Paul's Man about Town, Charlie Brown, Yellow, Purple, Red and Green ... Cap 'n' Gown
Published Wednesday, September 5, 2001
More than a week of events for St. Paul's "Charlie Brown Around Town'' finale begins Saturday with an art show of works from participating artists. The gallery, in the Lawson Commons retail space on Wabasha Street across from Ecolab Plaza, will also display the Charlie Brown statue created by Tom Everhart, who is permitted to do his own brand of "Peanuts'' art. The gallery will be open from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily until Sept. 16.
All 102 Charlie Brown statues are expected to be on display downtown along Wabasha Street and Rice Park during the finale. Other planned events include
Sept. 11, free root beer floats, Ecolab Plaza, Fifth and Wabasha streets, 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Sept. 12, Great Pumpkin Night, with sponsors handing out "trick 'n' treats'' items at their statues;
Sept. 15, music, arts and crafts, and a Project Linus blanket drive, Rice Park, noon to 6 p.m.
Sept. 16, grand farewell with a look-alike contest, a people's choice contest and 3 p.m. raffle drawing for the "Lucky Chuck'' statue, Ecolab Plaza.
For details and updates, visit www.ilovesaintpaul.com or call (651) 266-8989.
Charlie Brown around the Fair
As rain fell Wednesday, Minnesota State Fair visitors scurried among the 15 statues that were on display during "Charlie Brown Day.'' The event at the State Fair was one of the last as "Charlie Brown Around Town'' winds down in St. Paul. The summerlong celebration honors Charles Schulz, the late "Peanuts'' creator who grew up in the city.
August 30, 2001
By Karl J. Karlson
The St. Paul Pioneer Press
"Charlie Brown Day" at the Minnesota State Fair was celebrated Wednesday by hundreds of fans who stopped to admire and take pictures of 15 of the cartoon statues on display in Carousel Park in front of the Grandstand.
The day included a "new'' Charlie Brown statue, Charlie Brown leading the afternoon parade and a Charlie Brown look-alike contest. All this was the beginning of the end for "Charlie Brown Around Town,'' St. Paul's summer celebration of the work and life of the late "Peanuts" cartoonist Charles Schulz, who grew up in the city.
The statues will remain at the Fair until Labor Day and then move into downtown St. Paul. Then, all the other statues also will be moved into downtown, arrayed along Wabasha Street and Rice Park for a week until the "Blockhead'' Party the weekend of Sept. 15-16. After that event, about 60 of the 102 statues will be moved to the Mall of America, where they will be auctioned Sept. 30. The rest will be returned to their sponsors.
For many at the Fair, it was their first chance to see the 5-foot-tall statues that have been around St. Paul since early June. Many knew about the event and came specifically to see them.
"I got all 101 Snoopys last summer and am going to get all the Charlie Browns this year,'' said Cheryl Anderson of Minneapolis as she snapped a photo of the array.
Jodi Christianson, from Claremont, Minn., found the statues fun. "Everyone's a Charlie Brown fan,'' she said, boasting that the company she works for, Josten's, sponsored one of the statues. However, that statue is no more. Called "Yearbook Charlie,'' it was covered with pictures from St. Paul school yearbooks. The pictures were twice washed away by rain, and the statue is now cloaked with a blue gown, mortarboard and class ring and goes by the name "Cap 'n' Gown Charlie Brown."
The applause from the audience determined that 14-month-old Leif Anderson of Forest Lake was the winner of the look-alike contest, held in conjunction with radio station KS95. Luke's mother, Jeanne Anderson, said he's big for his age.
The red-headed youngster was unable to say "Good Grief'' like most of the 14 other contestants, but he was dressed in an orange T-shirt with the signature Charlie Brown black zigzag applied by his mother. The shirt is to be his Halloween costume.
"We heard about the contest and always said he looks like Charlie Brown, so we entered,'' Jeanne Anderson said.
Lee Koch, a vice president of Capital City Partnership, which is a sponsor of the Schulz tribute, said another round of statues next summer is a possibility.
"We are getting a lot of mail and e-mail suggesting we do this again, much of it specifically asking for Lucy statues, but we are weighing all the options,'' Koch said.
She said that by next summer, there will be seven permanent bronze sculptures of "Peanuts'' characters in a new downtown park.
"These may be the anchor for an annual festival,'' she said, adding that whatever takes place "there will be a "Peanuts' presence in St. Paul. That's for sure.''
"Peanuts" character scrapbooks sought
August 24, 2001
By Karl J. Karlson
St. Paul Pioneer Press
A scrapbook contest will be included in this weekend's regular Sunday in the Park event of "Charlie Brown Around Town" at Harriet Island Regional Park in downtown St. Paul.
The 1 to 4 p.m. event is part of the summer tribute to the late cartoonist Charles Schulz and his childhood in St. Paul.
People who have made scrapbooks of "Charlie Brown Around Town" and of last summer's "Peanuts on Parade" that feature statues of Snoopy are invited to show their collections. Scrapbooks also can be entered in a contest that will be judged by staff from Archiver's, the Photo Memory Store. First prize is a $50 gift certificate for use at the store.
Fans are invited to bring extra copies of their best photos to swap with other fans.
For people who have so far not found all 101 Charlie Brown statues, 14 of them will be moved to the Minnesota State Fair by Wednesday, which is "Charlie Brown Day" at the Fair. The 14 statues will be on display near the Grandstand through Labor Day.
Those statues and their numbers on the "Charlie Brown Around Town" map are No. 2, You're a Winner Charlie Brown; No. 6, Good Grief; No. 19, Where is Everybody?; No. 34, Railroad Charlie; No. 37, Remember, Restore, Rejoice!; No. 39, Head in the Clouds; No. 45, Carlitos Brown; No. 46, If I Only Had A Little Less Heart; No. 58, Graduate (a new design for "Yearbook Charlie" which has suffered weather damage); No. 67, Let Freedom Ring; No. 74, Shine Charlie Brown; No. 78, Sunburned Charlie; No. 85, Lucky Chuck; and No. 91, Good News Charlie Brown.
Charlie Brown going on tour
August 18, 2001
By Karl J. Karlson
The St. Paul Pioneer Press
A delegation from St. Paul will make a whirlwind, five-city tour Wednesday to invite all of Minnesota to the city for its mid-September "Blockhead Party," which is the culmination of this summer's Charles Schulz tribute.
The delegation -- complete with a different Charlie Brown statue that will be trucked to each city -- will include Mayor Norm Coleman and John Labosky, president of Capital City Partnership, one of the sponsors of the "Charlie Brown Around Town" tribute.
The delegation will fly to Rochester, Duluth, Bemidji, Moorhead and Alexandria to spread the word.
Coleman and Labosky will hand out souvenirs and a few raffle tickets to local officials, giving folks there a chance to win the "Lucky Chuck" statue. The work is being raffled as one of the tribute's many fund-raising efforts to pay for a series of bronze "Peanuts" sculptures that will be placed in a new downtown park.
"We want everyone to come to St. Paul to enjoy this wonderful event, 'Charlie Brown Around Town,' honoring Schulz, who grew up here," Coleman said Friday, as details of the fly-around were wrapped up.
Actually, only Coleman and Labosky will be flying, while a Charlie Brown statue is driven to a city for a daylong display to promote the attraction in St. Paul.
For the "Blockhead Party" -- Sept. 15-16 -- all of the Charlie Brown statues will be brought downtown and lined up along Wabasha Street. Events tentatively include a "Peanuts" character look-alike contest and raffle drawing for the "Lucky Chuck" statue.
About 60 of the Charlie Brown statues will be auctioned Sept. 30 at the Mall of America in Bloomington as the finale of the event.
Packing 'em in -- again!
August 14, 2001
By Karl J. Karlson
The St. Paul Pioneer Press
At noontime Monday, Danielle Aubin struggled to push a stickpin into the U.S. map set up at the "Charlie Brown Around Town" Doghouse information booth in downtown St. Paul.
It wasn't easy for her to pinpoint her hometown of Federal Way, Wash., on a map already covered with pins from some of the more than 15,000 visitors who have registered so far at the booth on Ecolab Plaza.
She -- along with her mother, Karen Aubin of Federal Way, and grandmother, Sally Lamirande of St. Paul -- was among the estimated 300 folks who stopped by the booth Monday for information about the city's tribute to the late "Peanuts" creator, Charles Schulz.
Lamirande, hosting the family tour, said the summerlong event is "fun" -- a nearly universal reaction to the city's second summer of "Peanuts" statues.
"We didn't get to see any of the Snoopys last summer, and I wanted to make sure they got to see these," Lamirande said of her summer visitors.
Danielle Aubin noted that Seattle this summer is sponsoring a similar event featuring pig statues. "They have these pigs in all sorts of costumes -- I don't know why," she said, adding that the Charlie Brown statues she has seen are "cool."
An average of about 300 visitors a day have stopped at the booth since it opened June 12, according to the St. Paul Convention and Visitors Bureau, a co-sponsor of the volunteer-staffed booth.
So far, visitors from 53 countries have registered and marked their home countries on the booth's world map, said bureau spokeswoman Amanda Engquist. That just surpasses the 52 countries recorded at last summer's "Peanuts on Parade."
This summer's visitors have reported coming from all seven continents, with one visitor placing a stickpin to mark Cape Poinsett in Antarctica. Like last year, all 50 states are represented.
Another popular destination for Charlie Brown fans has been Twin Cities Public Television's "Charlie Cam" Web site, which has been visited 70,152 times through Sunday. The site (www.tpt.org ), which has been in operation since June, shows the station's "Photog Charlie" statue at 172 E. Fourth St. The camera setup, which updates its image every 30 seconds, allows visitors to pose for photos that are carried on the Internet.
Also coming up is an event long sought by "Peanuts" fans -- a scrapbook and photo swap meet to be held from 1 to 4 p.m. Aug. 26 at Harriet Island Regional Park across the Mississippi River from downtown St. Paul.
Fans of both summer celebrations have asked for the opportunity to get together for such a swap meet to fill gaps in photo collections of all 101 Snoopys and 101 Charlie Browns that were on public display. There is no need for participants to preregister, event officials say.
Schulz Fund donates $1 million for music center
2-to-1 matching money goes to $10 million SR Symphony campaign for RP facility
August 14, 2001
By George Lauer
The Santa Rosa Press Democrat
The Schulz Fund has donated $1 million toward creation of a $75 million music center planned for Sonoma State University.
The gift from the fund endowed by "Peanuts" cartoonist Charles "Sparky" Schulz will go to the Santa Rosa Symphony, which has a goal of raising $10 million for the Green Music Center. Center promoters say the facility, to be built at the corner of Petaluma Hill Road and the Rohnert Park Expressway, will be a world-class music center.
The Schulz donation, part of the financial empire left when Schulz died last year, is a 2-to-1 matching gift. Each dollar donated by individuals and businesses will be doubled by the Schulz gift as part of a $10 million Conductor's Challenge campaign kicking off this fall.
"Sparky derived great pleasure from the symphony, and I know he would be very pleased by this challenge," said Schulz's widow, Jean Schulz.
The Green Music Center project, including land, parking lots, roads, bridges and buildings, will cost about $75 million. The community -- individuals, corporations, the university and groups such as the symphony -- is expected to come up with $47 million. The balance, about $28 million, will come from construction bonds for parking lots and business loans tied to a restaurant and gift store at the center.
Of the community's $47 million obligation for the center, $21 million has been collected, $7.5 million has been promised and about $18.5 million remains to be raised, said Jim Meyer, vice president of development at Sonoma State University.
The first performances will be staged sometime in 2004, Meyer said.
Modeled after Seiji Ozawa Hall at Tanglewood, Mass., the Green Music Center's main performance hall will become the home of the Santa Rosa Symphony as well as a major venue for other music and performing arts presentations.
"It's the extraordinary generosity of people like the Schulzes who help bring life to our dream of an acoustically perfect, visually stunning concert hall for our musicians and audiences," said Jeffrey Kahane, conductor and music director of the Santa Rosa Symphony.
St. Paul focuses on public spaces (editorial)
August 6, 2000
The Minneapolis Star Tribune
St. Paul has joined a growing list of American cities that understand the importance of integrating natural beauty and significant art into downtown streetscapes. The latest example came Thursday at the unveiling of plans to transform a half-block triangle at 6th and St. Peter streets -- now a parking lot -- into a festive urban park that will include bronze sculptures of Charles Schulz's "Peanuts" characters.
This is a fitting tribute to Schulz, who died last year after a half-century of bringing life to characters drawn from his childhood memories in St. Paul. The bronze figures will be subdued in tone and size, placed not as a centerpiece in the park, but as fellow visitors CharlieBrown and Snoopy sitting under a tree; Sally and Linus peering over a wall, a moonstruck Lucy leaning against Schroeder's toy piano.
The idea is to offer a sense of dignity and permanence to these characters and to provide a memorable experience for visitors. The park, yet unnamed, will also include lawns, trees, a bistro-style cafe and a flexible outdoor performance and exhibit area created by blocking off Market Street between the park and Landmark Center. Thus, the park becomes an outdoor extension of Landmark.
More important, the new park is just one of many exceptional outdoor spaces that promise to remake St. Paul into one of the country's most beautiful cities. Unlike downtown Minneapolis, with an extensive skyway system that essentially turns its back to the outdoors, St. Paul's downtown seems to embrace the elements with a hardy optimism. Eventually, "Peanuts park" will be just one in a series of picturesque steppingstones allowing people to meander from the Capitol to the Children's Museum, Landmark Center, Rice Park, the remodeled library, the Science Museum and a water taxi ride to Harriet Island. This is the walkable city of the future where workplaces, housing, shops and entertainment venues are intermingled -- and interconnected by beautiful public spaces.
Minnesotans should be grateful that their capital city's political and civic leaders understand and pursue these aesthetic goals. Minnesotans are, by nature, a pragmatic lot, suspicious of the fancy and the extravagant. Given our climate, it would be easier and cheaper to simply turn our downtown streets over to cars and to funnel people into skyways and other private interior spaces, as Minneapolis has largely done. St. Paul has chosen the more difficult path of encouraging pedestrians to share public streets and to enjoy outdoor spaces. It's a path that will take time and persistence, but will pay off in the
end.
Lovable loser is a crowd-pleaser
August 3, 2001
By Tim Harlow
Minneapolis Star Tribune
Charlie Brown might be a blockhead, but he's definitely not a bust.
One year after paying tribute to "Peanuts" creator and hometown hero Charles Schulz by placing scores of Snoopy statues throughout the city, St. Paul is honoring the cartoonist with "Charlie Brown Around Town."
More than 100 colorful statues of affable but unlucky Charlie Brown dot St. Paul's sidewalks, parks and plazas, and thousands of people from far and wide have come to ogle them since they appeared June 3.
"I saw all the Snoopys last year, so you've just got to continue," said Marge Cole, 50, of Richfield, who has seen most of the statues. "I just marvel at the work of the artists and all of the ideas. The golfer at Highland is just darling."
Although nobody knows how many people have gone "Chucking" (searching for Charlie Brown statues), more than 12,000 people representing 50 states and 40 countries have signed a guest book and picked up maps at the Dog House, an information booth on Ecolab Plaza in downtown St. Paul. Phones in city offices are ringing off the hook, and e-mails are coming in from around the world, said Megan Ryan, St. Paul's marketing and promotions director.
There are some rabid Chuckers out there," Ryan said. "The response has been quite surprising. There is an amazing affection for 'Peanuts' characters and Charles Schulz."
Ryan estimates that last year's Snoopys drew about 450,000 visitors to St. Paul and pumped $25 million into the downtown economy. After last year's successful tribute, Ryan wondered if another salute to Schulz would go over as well.
"We were a little worried, with the amazing response last year, what were we going to do this year?" she said. "But the public asked for something, and we were confident we could make it work."
The 101 statues, designed and decorated mostly by Minnesota artists (one was designed by an artist from Michigan), all will be taken downtown for the Blockhead Party on Sept. 15 and 16. That's when the 102nd statue -- "Surprise Charlie" -- will be unveiled.
From mid-August through Sept. 14, Chuckers also can participate in an online contest at www.ilovestpaul.com to vote for their favorite Charlie Brown. Cole has her favorites Butter Sculpture Charlie at the Science Museum of Minnesota and It's a Hole in One Charlie at the Highland Park Golf Course Clubhouse.
Cole has pictures of all the statues she has seen, but there is one thing she'd like even better Her own Charlie Brown. Cole bought a $1 raffle ticket in hopes of landing "Lucky Chuck," the bust designed by Lela Scott on view at Ecolab Plaza. Raffle tickets are available at the "Charlie Brown Around Town" shop, across the street from Ecolab Plaza at 5th and Wabasha Sts. The drawing will take place at the Blockhead Party on Sept. 16.
"I have space in my back yard; I have a spot reserved," Cole said.
The other 101 sculptures will be auctioned off Sept. 30 at the Mall of America. Proceeds will be used to finish a bronze sculpture of the "Peanuts" gang, to be unveiled in December, and to provide scholarships for cartoonists studying at the College of Visual Arts in St. Paul and the Art Instruction School in Minneapolis, where Schulz took classes and later taught.
Designs for tribute statues unveiled
Schulz's hometown gets family's thanks
August 3, 2001
By Karl J. Karlson
The St. Paul Pioneer Press
An emotional Amy Johnson thanked all of St. Paul on Thursday for its ongoing tribute to her late father, cartoonist Charles Schulz, and for his childhood memories here that inspired his "Peanuts" comic strip.
Choking up as she spoke, Johnson said she had a dream several weeks ago in which her father asked, "Who will remember me?" Johnson said she awoke before she could respond, but she told nearly 100 onlookers at a prenoon gathering in downtown, "The answer is, 'The city of St. Paul will remember you, Dad.' "
She and her family were in town to unveil plans for bronze sculptures of several of her father's most beloved characters that will reside at various spots in a new garden plaza to be built in the next two years on a triangle of land between Market, St. Peter and Fifth streets.
Although her father lived in California for the last 40 years of his life, Johnson said, his characters and "Peanuts" were based on his youth in St. Paul.
"Look at the strip; see all the snow," she said. "There is no snow in California."
Sketches unveiled Thursday show Charlie Brown and Snoopy lounging under a tree; Linus and Sally leaning on a wall; Marcie on a bench; Peppermint Patty kicking a football; and an adoring Lucy listening to Schroeder play his piano.
Mayor Norm Coleman, announcing the sculptures and plaza plans, said the statues in the park will be "bronze, big and huggable."
Planners hope eventually to display 11 bronze "Peanuts" statues in the park. The works, however, are meant not to be pieces of art on display but, rather, "visitors" to the park, which will be a signature site for downtown, according to John Labosky, president of the Capital City Partnership, which is coordinating the sculpture project. The site, owned by the St. Paul Riverfront Corp., will include a bistro, trees and a space to hold public events.
The bronze statues will be paid for by the sale of this summer's Charlie Brown statues and last year's Snoopy statues. The auction of the Snoopy statues raised nearly $800,000 toward the permanent tribute.
