Charles Schulz Donates $1M for Overlord Monument
October 24, 1997

Peanuts creator Charles M. Schulz is donating $1,000,000 and will lead a national fund raising effort to build a ten-acre memorial featuring a 44-foot tall granite arch with the word OVERLORD engraved across the top. The memorial will commemorate the World War II allied armed forces who stormed ashore at Normandy on June 6, 1944. "Operation Overlord" was the Allied Forces' code-name for the invasion.

Schulz was drafted into the Army at the age of 20 and served with the 20th Armored Division in France and Germany during World War II. Schulz has occasionally drawn on his wartime experiences for the backdrop to some of the episodes in his enormously popular comic strip. Although he didn't participate in the initial invasion, Schulz said he quickly came to appreciate the sacrifices made by all of the allied forces who punched a big hole in Hitler's vaunted Atlantic Wall as Schulz's own division fought its way across Europe.

Bob Slaughter, chairman of the National D-Day Memorial Foundation, hailed Schulz's appointment. "Without knowing it at the time, he and I were comrades-in-arms in the European Theater," says Slaughter, who went ashore in the Normandy assault wave. Slaughter was honored with two Purple Hearts for his role in the battle. Schulz is also putting up some of his artwork for the cause. A June 6, 1997 comic strip, featuring a helmeted Snoopy in the waters off Normandy, will be used in the fund-raising campaign. Its caption reads simply, "June 6, 1944, To remember."

"I believe D-Day is the most significant day for mankind in modern history," says Schulz.

Schulz's donation to the National D-Day Memorial enables organizers to break ground on the site, located in Bedford, VA, starting in November. The proposed memorial complex would occupy 10 acres on an 88-acre site, with a stirring view of the Blue Ridge Mountains.

Bedford, with a population in 1944 of only 3,200, was the home to Company A of the 116th Infantry Regiment. Of the 170-soldier company, 91 men died, 64 were wounded, and only 15 were able to continue fighting. Of the 35 Bedford soldiers in Company A, 19 died in the invasion's first15 minutes, and two more died later in the day.

War historians say the 21 deaths from the tiny town of Bedford were the highest per-capita loss from any single community.

"Their hard-fought victory set the Nazis on their heels and eased the way for the rest of us," the 74-year-old Schulz noted from his home in Santa Rosa, CA. "I am proud to help in any way I can to make the long overdue National D-Day Memorial to the valor, fidelity and sacrifice of the allied forces a reality as quickly as possible."

The public can contribute to the memorial by contacting the National D-Day Memorial Foundation at 1-800-351-DDAY.

- PBO for ICF