Some days, it seems that I cannot get far away from Peanuts, no matter what I’m doing. For example, at the moment I’m working on an article about some mid-1960s cartoon books about Jewish women who run brothels. Really, there’s more than one of these – at least six. It was a thing. And in doing so, I reference the 1964 movie that likely inspired them, A House is Not a Home, starring Shelley Winters in the adaptation of Jewish madam Polly Adler’s 1953 autobiography. And there in the cast list is Kaye Ballard… the comedienne who recorded an album of Peanuts humor in 1962. So then I look a little more into the book the film was based on, and it was originally published in 1953. By Rinehart & Co., the publishing company that at the time was in the midst of publishing the early Peanuts books.
All roads lead to Peanuts.
