Eleven days after the 1968 assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Los Angeles school teacher Harriet Glickman wrote a letter to Peanuts creator Charles Schulz asking him to consider integrating his popular comic strip. Their correspondence that spring led to the debut of Franklin, the strip’s first Black character on July 31, 1968. Now 56 years later, Franklin headlines his very own Charlie Brown animated TV special, “Welcome Home, Franklin,” debuting Friday on Apple TV+ In another nod to Peanuts history, Franklin’s namesake, “Jumpstart” cartoonist Robb Armstrong is one of the new 40-minute special’s co-writers, joining Cornelius Uliano, Schulz’s son Craig and grandson Bryan. In 1994, an anxious Schulz phoned the “Jumpstart” creator to ask if he could borrow Armstrong for Franklin after realizing he needed a last name for the character when all the players are announced on the field in “You’re in the Super Bowl, Charlie Brown.” While Charles Schulz died in 2000, Franklin Armstrong lives on. In 2018, Glickman joined Robb Armstrong onstage at the Schulz Museum in California to celebrate the 50^th anniversary of the trailblazing comics character.

Released as part of Black History Month, “Welcome Home, Franklin” uses scenes from Schulz’s original 1968 strips as a jumping off point to create Franklin’s full back story of a military kid who moves from town to town as his dad is frequently reassigned (In 1968, Franklin’s father was serving in Vietnam).

As Franklin struggles to fit into his new neighborhood populated with eccentric residents like Linus Van Pelt (who is obsessed with tending his pumpkin patch) and his older sister, the eternally crabby neighborhood shrink/lemonade purveyor Lucy Van Pelt, he decides to make friends by competing in the upcoming soap box derby race. Working beside Charlie Brown to build a car, Franklin introduces his new friend to pro baseball’s Negro League, James Brown and the music of John Coltrane (a wonderful homage to the animated series’ nearly 60-year history of introducing jazz to young people, beginning with the jazz pianist Vince Guaraldi Trio-created soundtrack for “A Charlie Brown Christmas” in 1965).

In addition to the special’s jazzy soundtrack, gorgeous animation and funny yet poignant script about the power of friendship, “Welcome Home, Franklin” thoughtfully updates a scene from “A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving,” Franklin’s 1973 introduction into the animated specials that some fans in recent years have taken to social media to criticize.

In advance of Friday’s “Welcome Home, Franklin” premiere on Apple TV+, Craig Schulz sat down with Eldredge ATL via Zoom to discuss the heartwarming new special and his father’s progressive place in civil rights history. The following conversation has been edited for clarity.

Eldredge ATL: I’m sitting here in Atlanta about a mile from MLK’s birthplace. In many ways, this special honors your dad and the origin of Franklin. Can you talk a bit about why it was important for your father to create Franklin?

Schulz: I think it truly speaks to my dad’s braveness and his commitment to the kind of world he wanted and the messaging he was sending out. When Harriet Glickman reached out to him, I don’t think there’s any doubt whatsoever that he would want to do it. The problem was, How do you introduce a Black character he didn’t know how to write for necessarily? So he had to figure out, ‘How am I going to write for this character and do service for the Black community but not offend the Black community?’ And the same thing came up for us writing this special. When we started it was just myself, my son Bryan and Cornelius Uliano, three white guys. So that’s when we reached out to Robb Armstrong. With Robb on board, he could fill in those missing parts of the puzzle. We would always confer with him and get his take on it.

Eldredge ATL: Why was now the right time to tell Franklin’s origin story and how did you come up with the idea for the special?

Schulz: Franklin is one of the most beloved characters in the comic strip. People love Franklin because he’s probably the most grounded character in the strip. My dad couldn’t make Franklin some kind of lunatic character the way some of the other characters are. We’ve taken the original beach scene where Franklin and Charlie Brown meet when Sally’s beach ball rolls up and rather than telling the story from that point on, we decided to go backwards in time. By going back in time, we could get into the Where did he come from? How did he get here? And How does he come to embrace this crazy neighborhood?

Eldredge ATL: From that beach scene to Linus in the pumpkin patch, your dad’s original strips from 1968 are hardwired into this special. It’s kind of like he’s one of the co-writers with you.

Schulz: Yeah, definitely all the credit really goes to my dad. There’s no doubt about that. I always say he gave us a Stradivarius. All we had to do is play it. When we were trying to get across that Franklin is moving in this white neighborhood, that question was How do you do that in Peanuts language? How would my dad have written this scene? And to see kids sitting there with vanilla ice cream cones and Franklin looks at that riding past in the car and realizes ‘there’s not a lot of variety in this neighborhood.’ It’s one of my favorite scenes. Franklin is seeing what he’s getting himself into.

Eldredge ATL: This is coming out during Black History Month and Franklin’s namesake is a part of the writing team. Only after your dad’s death did Robb Armstrong reveal that 1994 story about the phone call. There was no press release at the time. Nobody knew, not even your mom. Was that characteristic of your dad?

Schulz: Dad always embraced his fellow cartoonists. He was continually making phone calls to other cartoonists. So when it came time that he needed a last name for Franklin, he obviously thought of Rob and called him. I think Rob thought it was kind of a joke like ‘Why would you ask for my permission?’ Rob was obviously honored. I think he really enjoyed being on this project, too, because it’s something new. When you’re a cartoonist, it’s kind of a lonely life. You go down in the dungeon and you’re all by yourself for endless hours on end, trying to think of ideas. There’s not a lot of communication. So to be part of this big team creating an animation special, I think, was very exciting for him.

Eldredge ATL: “Welcome Home, Franklin” executive producer is Paige Braddock, an old friend from when we worked together at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Can you talk a bit about Paige’s contribution to the special?

Schulz: My dad met Paige Braddock at some event, maybe the [National Cartoonists Society] Reuben [Awards], and out of nowhere, just invited her to come work for him. So she packed everything up in her little Ford Mustang and drove out there. She’d only been with us for probably six months before my dad had the heart attack. Luckily, she stuck around and on these projects, she’s part of the overseeing group that we run stuff by. She gets to read the scripts, looks at the animation, and then her team of 26 looks at the animation that [director] Raymond [Persi] creates and if anything doesn’t look quite right, they will make comments. Paige will say, ‘Hey, that finger isn’t right’ or No, Peppermint Patty would never say that. Peppermint Patty isn’t smart enough to say that.’ You have to live in the universe. And again, she’s been immersed in it for 23 years now.

Eldredge ATL: There’s a scene at the end of this special that’s a callback to Franklin’s animated introduction in 1973’s “A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving.” In recent years in social media posts, some fans have called out Franklin sitting by himself on one side of the table at the Snoopy curated Thanksgiving dinner. In “Welcome Home, Franklin” the final scene directly addresses that. Why was that important for you to add in this new special?

Schulz: I think that affected my son more than anybody else because he’s part of the internet generation and had seen all the memes, the hate, the trolls, and so forth. So while we were crafting the special, Bryan came to me one day and said, ‘Wouldn’t it be great if we could kind of correct that scene?’ I see it as a continuation of the 1973 scene. Raymond had the camera in the exact same angle and the table was at the exact same angle. And then Linus says, ‘Hey, Franklin, what are you doing over there? Come join us.’ They’re embracing Franklin into their neighborhood and what better scene to use to do that? Based on the trailer released on the Apple TV+ network, the scene is receiving a tremendous response.

Eldredge ATL: In many ways, “Welcome Home, Franklin” is a tribute not only Franklin but also your father’s legacy. There are so many nuances in the writing you feel like it could be a Charles Schulz script. What would your dad think about this new special placing Franklin into the spotlight?

Schulz: Well, I never try to figure out what he would think about something. But I hope he would be very proud of this special. We spent a lot of time, sometimes days trying to think of just one line for the script. And a lot of times, I would go back to comic strip and [the answer] would just pop into my mind. I can always hear him talking in the way he talked. He could pick just the right word for the right situation. That takes a lot of talent. For me, it’s not just about preserving his legacy and trying to continue what he did but also to drive people back to the comic strip. We want people to see the genius of what my dad created.

“Welcome Home, Franklin,” a brand-new Peanuts animated special will debut on Apple TV+ Friday, February 16. To read more about Harriet Glickman’s 1968 letter to Charles Schulz and read the first Peanuts strips featuring Franklin go to the official Schulz Museum website.

Richard L. Eldredge

Richard L. Eldredge is the founder and editor in chief of Eldredge ATL. As a reporter for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Atlanta magazine, he has covered Atlanta since 1990.