State woman was `Peanuts' voice

POULSBO, Kitsap County - Just like the kids Charles Schulz portrayed in "Peanuts," the children selected for his characters' TV voices were boys and girls from the neighborhood.

"They were all neighborhood people," said Karen White of Poulsbo, who was the original voice for Lucy, the little girl who spent decades heckling Charlie Brown.

She said the producer of the "Peanuts" television specials is her cousin, Lee Mendelson, and he drew on the children in Hillsborough, Calif., where White grew up.

"This was just something Lee would do," White said Monday, the day Schulz's final daily "Peanuts" cartoon appeared in the comic strips. "He calls up one day and says how would you like to be a voice for me?

White had voice parts in "A Boy Named Charlie Brown" (1963) and "Charlie Brown's All Stars" (1966).

White, 44, who is married to wood carver Brent White, is director of the Ashley Gardens residential home for Alzheimer's patients in Bremerton.

White said she had seen Schulz only once as a child and had lost touch with Mendelson. Then her connection with "Peanuts" was renewed last year when her son, Patrick, then 15, interviewed Mendelson for a family history project.

Impressed with Brent White's carvings of carousel animals, Mendelson commissioned a carving of Snoopy the dog on a rocking stand. The family drove to Santa Rosa, Calif., in October to present the carving to Schulz.

White said that while her "Peanuts" part was small and many years ago, she still gets reminders of those times when a residual check pops up in the mail. Last year she got one for $310 and another for $10.