Schroeder (Peanuts) Schroeder (Peanuts) Schroeder is a fictional character in the long-running comic strip "Peanuts", created by Charles M. Schulz. He is distinguished by his precocious skill at playing the toy piano, as well as by his love of classical music and the composer Ludwig van Beethoven in particular. Schroeder is also the catcher on Charlie Brown's baseball team, though he is always seen walking back to the pitcher's mound with the baseball, never throwing it—admitting in one strip he did not want the other team to discover his lack of ability. He is also the object of the unrequited infatuation of
Peanuts strip as one panel, partly for experimentation, but also to combat the dwindling size of the comics page. Later in the '90s, Schulz abandoned the characters Patty, Violet, Pigpen and Franklin. Schulz drew the strip for nearly 50 years, with no assistants, even in the lettering and coloring process. In the late 1970s, during Schulz's negotiations with United Feature Syndicate over a new contract, syndicate president William C. Payette hired superhero comic artist Al Plastino to draw a backlog of "Peanuts" strips to hold in reserve in case Schulz left the strip. When Schulz and the syndicate reached a successful