Snoopy Vs. The Red Baron

Jim Adams has challenged us to write about a song that contains the words Chat/Laugh/Rant/Scream/Talk. I have picked a song about another challenge – the classic duel between the Red Baron and the Peanuts’ Snoopy in 1966. The Royal Guardsmen’s song was written by Phil Gernhard & Dick Holler and was released in November 1966. It tells how Charles Schultz’s comics depicted Snoopy imagining himself as a WWI fighter pilot, battling the Red Baron Manfred von Richthofen.

The song sparked all kinds of images for me as a pre-teen on its release, and I thought it would be a fun addition today.

Lyrics:

After the turn of the century
In the clear blue skies over Germany
Came a roar and a thunder men had never heard
Like the screamin’ sound of a big war bird

Up in the sky, a man in a plane
Baron von Richthofen was his name
Eighty men tried, and eighty men died
Now, they’re buried together on the countryside

Ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty or more
The Bloody Red Baron was rollin’ up the score
Eighty men died tryin’ to end that spree
Of the Bloody Red Baron of Germany

In the nick of time, a hero arose
A funny-lookin’ dog with a big black nose
He flew into the sky to seek revenge
But the Baron shot him down (Curses, foiled again!)

Ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty or more
The Bloody Red Baron was rollin’ up the score
Eighty men died tryin’ to end that spree
Of the Bloody Red Baron of Germany

Now, Snoopy had swore that he’d get that man
So he asked the Great Pumpkin for a new battle plan
He challenged the German to a real dogfight
While the Baron was laughin‘, he got him in his sight

That Bloody Red Baron was in a fix
He tried everything, but he’d run out of tricks
Snoopy fired once, and he fired twice
And that Bloody Red Baron went spinnin’ out of sight

Ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty or more
The Bloody Red Baron was rollin’ up the score
Eighty men died tryin’ to end that spree
Of the Bloody Red Baron of Germany

Well, ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty or more
The Bloody Red Baron was rollin’ up the score

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Padre