Lynn C. Woolsey: “On Saturday night, millions of Americans lost their security blanket. Life will not be the same without Charles Schulz.…”

“On Saturday night, millions of Americans lost their security blanket. Life will not be the same without Charles Schulz. The touching human stories he told every day through the Peanuts characters in his cartoons gave us such warmth that old and young understood how Linus felt holding his trusty blanket. Now our friend is gone, and we will have to rely on memoirs. Fortunately, Charles Schulz left us plenty of these. I knew Sparky as a silver-haired man who spent time every week at Redwood Empire Ice Arena in Santa Rosa, California, located in my district. I also knew him as a hard-working artist who traveled from his home in the district of my colleague, the gentleman from California (Mr. Thompson), to his studio in Santa Rosa. But my colleague from California and I are not the only people who shared Charles Schulz; neither is our colleague, the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Sabo), who represents the district that Charles Schulz was born and raised in. Charles Schulz left a piece of himself with every single person whose day was brightened by one of his cartoons. We let Peanuts into our lives on a daily basis, and the cartoon characters came to feel like a part of our families. Like so many Americans and people around the world, I delighted in following the ups and downs of Snoopy, Charlie Brown, Lucy, and the rest of the gang. My kids grew up on Peanuts.”