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Charles M. Schulz was first implored to introduce a Black character to the Peanuts gang after receiving a letter from a teacher, Harriet Glickman, following the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.
Franklin Armstrong debuted in July 1968, just three months later
Today, Franklin is a fan favorite whose story has continued to grow in the decades since
Like many Americans,Charles M. Schulzwas profoundly changed by the April 1968 assassination ofMartin Luther King Jr.
Yet it wasn't until a school teacher wrote him a letter suggesting a Black member be added to the Peanuts gang that he realized he could actually do something with those feelings.
PEOPLEspoke with the teacherwho wrote to Schulz, Harriet Glickman, in 2015, where she shared her amazement that her letter even got a response, let alone led to change.
"Like so many others, I felt helpless and like I had to do something," she said at the time. Glickman believed the comic strip creator was the perfect person to promote ideas of acceptance, explaining that she wanted to talk to him "about what it would be like for a Black child to see themselves in a comic strip."
"Dear Mr. Schulz," shewrote in the letter, "since the death of Martin Luther King, I've been asking myself what I can do to help change those conditions in our society which led to the assassination and which contribute to the vast sea of misunderstanding, hate, fear and violence."
She recalled Schulz's initial hesitation, admitting he was concerned Black Americans might find the character was patronizing or inauthentic.
Glickman then consulted her own community to gauge his concerns, sharing one friend's comments with the cartoonist. In that time, Schulz also received other letters imploring him to integrate the comic strip — so, he did.
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On July 1, 1968, the cartoonist wrote back to Glickman, "You'll be pleased to see the character in the strip in the week of July 29," something which was "pretty exciting" for Glickman to hear back about. That week's comic strip, which came less than four months after the assassination of MLK, featured an introduction to Franklin Armstrong.
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Glickman told PEOPLE that she remembered the comic having "a huge effect."
"When people saw it, there were a lot of positive reactions," she recalled in her 2015 interview.
The idea, however, wasn't met with open arms from everyone, with a number of editors objecting to different elements of Franklin's inclusion.
"There was one strip where Charlie Brown and Franklin had been playing on the beach, and Franklin said, 'Well, it's been nice being with you, come on over to my house some time. [My editors] didn't like that. Another editor protested once when Franklin was sitting in the same row of school desks with Peppermint Patty, and said, 'We have enough trouble here in the South without you showing the kids together in school,' " Schulz shared in a1988 interview.
"But I never paid any attention to those things, and I remember telling [United Features president] Larry [Rutman] at the time about Franklin — he wanted me to change it, and we talked about it for a long while on the phone, and I finally sighed and said, 'Well, Larry, let's put it this way: Either you print it just the way I draw it or I quit. How's that?' So that's the way that ended."
In 2024, the specialSnoopy Presents: Welcome Home, Franklindove deeper into the character's backstory. It shared Franklin's background, previously disclosed in the comic strip, as the son of a military family who meets Charlie Brown and strikes up a friendship.
Today, he's a fan favorite and testament to Schulz's willingness to confront issues of the day in his own way, with his own characters.
Schulz died in February 2000, at the age of 77. Glickman, meanwhile,died 20 years later, in 2020, at the age of 93.
Read the original article onPeople
