Yes, it's true: Schulz took a vacation, no doubt to re-charge his batteries. During that time, the syndicate re-ran old strips ... a detail that Fantagraphics fails to mention in the 1997-98 volume of their Complete Peanuts series.
A casual reader thus would conclude, incorrectly, that the strips during 1997's final five weeks were new at the time, just like all the others that year.
Sharp-eyed fans will note, however, that each of these repeated strips bears a three-digit date (i.e. 12/25/97) as opposed to the two-digit dates (12/25) usually placed each day.
And yes, anticipating the obvious question, we can tell you which reprints ran on which day:
11/27 — 11/25/92
11/28 — 11/26/92
11/29 — 12/28/88
11/30 — 11/27/88
12/1 — 12/3/87
12/2 — 12/8/89
12/3 — 11/29/90
12/4 — 12/1/90
12/5 — 12/4/90
12/6 — 12/5/90
12/7 — 12/18/88
12/8 — 12/6/90
12/9 — 12/8/90
12/10 — 12/10/90
12/11 — 12/11/90
12/12 — 12/12/90
12/13 — 12/13/90
12/14 — 12/3/89
12/15 — 12/10/91
12/16 — 12/8/92
12/17 — 12/21/89
12/18 — 12/22/89
12/19 — 12/23/89
12/20 — 12/29/87
12/21 — 12/20/87
12/22 — 12/13/89
12/23 — 12/9/89
12/24 — 12/24/87
12/25 — 12/25/91
12/26 — 12/13/88
12/27 — 12/14/88
12/28 — 12/2/90
12/29 — 12/15/88
12/30 — 12/17/88
12/31 — 12/31/92
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