Charles M. Schulz hated the name "Peanuts."

It sounds trite. It sounds cute. It sounds like everything that has groundbreaking comic strip, which made its debut 75 years ago this month — October 2, 1950 — was not.

"Well! Here comes ol' Charlie Brown," says Shermy to Patty — not Peppermint Patty, who came along much later — in that very first strip. Those were the only three characters.

"Good ol' Charlie Brown ...Yes sir!" Shermy says. "Good ol' Charlie Brown..."

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Schulz didn't establish much about his child characters in those first few strips. But he did establish one thing from the get-go. They were not Cute.

"There's this emotional darkness that filters through the strips, right until the end," s

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