Where's that Laughter Coming From, Charlie Brown?

A Charlie Brown Christmas (1965) is one of the longest-running Christmas specials aired each year on television.

It was the first time that Charles Schulz's Peanuts gang made it off the comic strip to the small screen. It was done on a shoestring budget, which meant there were glitches. The animation was also somewhat choppy. The executives at CBS were worried. The special was going to break a lot of the accepted "rules" of children's animated holiday specials...

This included the decision to use the voices of real children (as opposed to adult actors who could sound like children); and a jazzy soundtrack by Vince Guaraldi.

And Charles Schulz was adamant that there be no laugh track. He figured the kids watching should know if something was funny enough. They didn't need to be told.

CBS executives were particularly nervous when Charles Schulz also insisted on using the final narration by Linus on the true meaning of Christmas (which used words straight out the Bible).

But, as it turns out, sometimes executives get nervous about the wrong things.

When the Christmas special was aired, it was a hit. It went on to win an Emmy. And, even though it's 45 years old this year, the program is still aired annually and has become a Christmas classic.

Sometimes you never know when something will work. For the Charlie Brown Christmas Special, Schulz stood by what he wanted for the show.

And it paid off.