USATODAY.com - The Christmas classic that almost wasn't

USATODAY.com - The Christmas classic that almost wasn't: "When CBS bigwigs saw a rough cut of A Charlie Brown Christmas in November 1965, they hated it.
Charlie and Linus: The Peanuts gang explains the meaning of Christmas again Tuesday, 40 years after the show's TV debut. Charlie and Linus: The Peanuts gang explains the meaning of Christmas again Tuesday, 40 years after the show's TV debut.
1965 photo by United Feature Syndicate

'They said it was slow,' executive producer Lee Mendelson remembers with a laugh. There were concerns that the show was almost defiantly different: There was no laugh track, real children provided the voices, and there was a swinging score by jazz pianist Vince Guaraldi."