When the leaves begin to turn brown and crunch under my feet, I know that it is soon pumpkin time. No, not pumpkin carving, pumpkin pie, or pumpkin pales. It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown time. If all the best aspects of Fall were condensed into one 25-minute television special, it would be the Great Pumpkin. The Halloween classic, since its release in 1966, has become synonymous with Halloween, and it’s no wonder why. Based on the comic strips of Charles M. Schulz, Linus spends all of Halloween night sitting in the pumpkin patch with Sally waiting for the Great Pumpkin, the number #2 below Santa, to appear. The rest of the Peanuts gang spends the night trick-or-treating and having fun at a Halloween party, with Lucy asking for extra candy for her “blockhead brother”, and Charlie Brown stating at each door that he “got a rock.” Of course, you can’t forget about Snoopy as the WWI Flying Ace, scouring through the hills of suburbia as if they were the war-torn countryside. Good luck to you if you spend your Halloween night like Linus waiting for the Great Pumpkin, and if you do go trick-or-treating, here’s sending you my best wishes that you yourself don’t get a rock.
– Bryn Seltzer
There really is an episode of Charlie Brown for every holiday!