Above: a PEANUTS Ford advertisement from the June 30-July 7, 1962 SATURDAY EVENING POST.
The PEANUTS specials were not the first time that that Charlie Brown, Lucy, Linus, Snoopy and the gang were animated. You may have heard of their Ford ads, which pre-dated their first one, the Charlie Brown Christmas special, by 6 or 7 years.
I didn't know that there were special PEANUTS comic strips, like the one with Snoopy, above, that were part of the ad campaign. Seeing that strip, which I am assuming was drawn specifically for Ford, was a surprise and I wonder how many more are out there.
Here's a 1961 Ford Falcon TV commercial, with Linus and Pigpen:
It all started in 1959, when Charles Schulz' characters appeared in the opening to the Tennessee Ernie Ford who. They also did the commercials for the sponsor of the show, Ford Motors.
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3 comments:
Interesting. I've heard of the Ford campaign but never saw any materials until now.
My 'Peanuts' knowledge is rusty these days---is this the only time Schulz drew Snoop's house in 2 point perspective, or did he do it in the strip, too?
You found some gems there. I particularly liked the Tennessee Ernie Ford opening (does anyone besides me still remember Mr. Ford?)--that was a pretty clever and charming bit of animation.
Jeff, Mr. Schulz drew the angled view of Snoopy's doghouse pretty regularly in the '50s and into the '60s. Sometime around the Red Baron era, he settled on the side-view-only. In general, early Peanuts showed a lot more variety in perspective, point of view, background detail (houses, streets, toys, trees) that Mr. Schulz gradually stylized and simplified.
There's more Ford Falcon + Peanuts materials over at this site:
http://collectpeanuts.com/wp/promotional-materials-giveaways/ford-falcon/
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