The Kite-Eating Tree

FIRST APPEARANCE:

April 12, 1956

Kite-Eating Trees are a distinct species of tree that lives and thrives in the fields near Charlie Brown’s home. Unlike other plants that show very little interest in toys, these trees LOVE to eat kites. Charlie Brown’s kites specifically. Poor Charlie Brown would love to keep a kite in the air, but no matter how hard he tries, the winds are always against him. Almost instantly he gets tangled in string, hanging from a branch of the tree, while it happily munches his kite.

DID YOU KNOW:

"I have never been a very successful kite flyer and have used the excuse that I never lived where there were good areas to fly kites. When I was growing up, we always lived in residential areas which had too many trees and too many telephone wires. Recollections of those handicaps inspired Charlie Brown's troubles with kite flying. As I grew older and tried to fly kites for my own children, I discovered that I still had the same problems. I observed that when a kite becomes caught in a tall tree, it is irretrievable and gradually disappears over a period of several weeks. Now obviously the kite had to go someplace, so it seemed to me that the tree must be eating it. This is how the series developed about Charlie Brown's violent battles with his local 'kite-eating tree.'" —Charles M. Schulz