Sally Dryer was just 8 years old when she walked into a recording studio in San Francisco in 1965 and began to talk -- at the time not fully aware that she was providing the voices for some of the most beloved Peanuts characters.
"Lee Mendelson told me along the way that I was referred to as the 'original Lucy,'" Dryer said, a Jerome artist and co-owner of the Nellie Bly gallery. "So I'll hold on to it."
Her older sister was working for Mendelson, a producer, who was working to create several Peanuts TV specials, when she asked Sally to do a voice recording that would later be submitted to Mendelson. He liked what he heard and the rest is history.
Until she was 12 years old, Dryer provided the voices for three Peanuts characters, most notably, Lucy van Pelt -- the grumpy friend of Charlie Brown who never could hold that football steady.
"They wanted her to be as crabby as possible and they said my voice had a particular quality of crabbiness that they appreciated," Dryer said with a laugh.
At the time, Dryer said she didn't fully realize what she was doing, but was motivated by the day off from school and the free hamburgers. She said there were a group of kids at the recording studio who would take turns going in and out of the booth.
"We would get the script, but we were such little kids that they would read us a line and we would repeat it," she said.
This process, which was more mimicking than acting, could take as little as one or as many as 30 takes. And outside the studio, Dryer said the other kids would be playing and riding up and down in the elevator.
Dryer's voice is featured in several popular Peanuts TV specials including, "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown" and "A Charlie Brown Christmas." Dryer said she happened upon the airing of the Halloween special this year and pointed out her voice to several friends watching with her.
"It's me, It's me," she said.
Around 12 years old, Dryer's voice began to change and so did her role with the Peanuts. She was re-assigned to voice a supporting character, which she said the producers did gently, before ending her voice acting career.
In Dryer's art studio, a display case full of Lucy memorabilia serves as a reminder of fond memories of the years she spent as a Peanut, a comic strip she says has remained timeless due to creator Charles Schultz.
"He was talking to me and he said – you know it's like I do a term paper everyday. He did a strip everyday," Dryer said. "You could really feel his specialness."
