Back to the Pumpkin Patch

Here’s an anniversary worth celebrating—with costumes, candy, and carved jack-’o-lanterns. As blogger Terence Towles Canote reminds us,

It was fifty years ago today, on October 27, 1966, that the Halloween special It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown debuted on CBS. It was actually the third of the Peanuts specials to air, after A Charlie Brown Christmas in 1965 and Charlie Brown’s All-Stars earlier in 1966. Alongside A Charlie Brown Christmas it would arguably become the most popular of the Peanuts television specials. …

It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown would not only be historic as the first time in the Peanuts TV specials in which the Great Pumpkin was referenced. It was also historic as the first TV special that portrayed Snoopy’s recurring fantasy of fighting the Red Baron, a running joke that had been introduced only a little over a year before the special aired (on October 10, 1965).

You can read all of Canote’s note here. And if you can’t find time to watch It’s a Great Pumpkin this year (it is scheduled for broadcast again tomorrow night, October 28, at 8 p.m. ET/PT on ABC-TV), you can always watch the full, half-hour episode on YouTube.