The Smurfs -- led by Papa Smurf and Smurfette -- kicked off a year of 50th birthday celebrations Monday with Smurfberry cake and sasparilla juice.

The Smurfs were created in 1958 by the cartoonist Pierre Culliford, known as "Peyo." The late cartoonist Pierre Culliford -- best known by his pen name, "Peyo" -- first introduced the tiny blue figures in a comic strip in October 1958. He called them Schtroumpf; they became known worldwide as the Smurfs.

The Smurfs, forest dwellers who live in little white-capped mushroom homes, developed their own "Smurf" language in which nouns and verbs were interchanged. Their debut on U.S. television in 1981 launched their global rise to stardom and made the Smurfs a household name. A Smurf is a Pitufo in Spanish, a Schlumpf in German, Nam Ching Ling to the Chinese, a Sumafa in Japan and Dardassim in Hebrew.

Posted by: Lawrenkm at 06:38 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 151 words, total size 1 kb.